COVID-19 Megathread 6: Return of the Omicron

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

It's official.


https://twitter.com/POTUS/status/1428106711009841153

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

I think the craziest was a guy that was full of conspiracy theories, didn't think it was real but then claimed that we gave it to him on purpose even though he came to the hospital with all the classic symptoms. His family was even worse, literally blaming us for giving him covid. It was bizarre.

Reminds me of this genius.

https://twitter.com/RonFilipkowski/status/1423794706388029440

#thoughtsAndPrayers

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

https://twitter.com/sahilkapur/status/1428712218112233472

FWIW, the non-white, esp black, are still disproportionately hospitalized, even though white are probably disproportionately leaning R.

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

https://twitter.com/sahilkapur/status/1428712218112233472

FWIW, the non-white, esp black, are still disproportionately hospitalized, even though white are probably disproportionately leaning R.

What about professional class and middle class minorities?

I don't know if there is such information. CDC provides only by age/sex/race.
https://gis.cdc.gov/grasp/covidnet/COVID19_5.html

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

It’s coming from that great resource covestim.com

The problem with those statistics for the US is that they don't work with data which is by date of report rather than by date of occurrence. And that means

1. You need states which provide the latter
2. You can only calculate two weeks after

That is what the UK does and all official statistical agencies.

Anyone trying to calculate daily R is not actually trying to estimate R because the data to do so doesn't exist. I say that as someone who worked on this last spring.That is not how any official government agency or statistical agency does it. Ie. France, UK, Germany, Canada, internal US state and CDC ones.

The reason is precisely what you mention.

Take Louisiana

There are no reports on Saturdays or Sundays
Some Parishes only report three days a week. Those days are different. Some report every day.
Parishes have no central recording. For deaths they simply report coroner reports. For cases they report what is notified but it is literally random ladies filling stuff in when they have a chance in many of those places.
Also some testing labs only report at certain times in batches which involve multiple days
Private providers like CVS also tend to not report cases as they come in but rather dump

They then report to the state statistical agency which then publishes.

The problem is on a given day what shows up for new cases are
Two days worth of cases for some parishes.
One day worth for others.
Zero days worth for others.

Which will get you an R that jumps like a yo-yo.

You can account for this, I guess (by adding smooth/lag).
Here's a good source.

https://epiforecasts.io/covid/posts/national/united-states/

LO has 0.99 (0.68 – 1.3)
NV has 1 (0.81 – 1.2)

Map + 10 states sorting by Rt.

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

The scariest part of this to me is Florida, because it's more vaccinated than the national average and things are still getting this bad there.  Does not bode well at all for the North in Oct-Dec!  Really hope they crank out those boosters promptly and efficiently, because I suspect no state has reached herd immunity yet.

This is a horribly misleading way, bordering on intentional, of looking at it as the states that are in the 30s-% range are dragging down the national average. The entire Northeast is at or above 70% while Florida is only at 50%--and bear in mind it's only just now reaching that 50% mark, and things were terrible there before that. Not to mention they're a resort state who is acting as if there is no covid which is a recipe for the disaster that's unfolding.

False. VT has highest rate at 67% fully vaccinated vs FL 51%. NY has 58%, and DC has 56%. So FL has similar level comparing with bigger NE states.

Smaller NE states are better, esp if you look at vaccination of older population. Among 65+ VT has 99% (!!), ME has 98% vs Floridas 87%, though slightly better than NY 86% or DC 83%.

I wonder what % of vaccination among medical/nursing home etc personal is. Suspect, that for example NY has higher than FL. Would explain a lot.

Another reasons FL is now hit harder than for instance NY, are climate and that (D) Cuomo already managed to kill grandmas. "Weirdly", it has never really been a big deal among Dem and their media.

If you look at EU, Spain and Portugal that have Florida'ish climate are now in top of vaccination rates and are very good at vaccinating older population (66% of all ages and 92% of 40+ are fully vaccinated, so better than VT) . They've been very strict on useless mask etc, still they are now hit (death per capita) ~20 times harder than Scandinavia that followed science and barely use masks at all.

https://ig.ft.com/coronavirus-vaccine-tracker

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

The lack of transparency is really ironic but it isn't when you see that a lot of these Elite Republican politicians being trained at Ivy League schools where there are a lot of professors from places like China or Vietnam, where there is an instilment of Confucian Values. That alone accounts for quite a bit for how Republicans behave. The entire Confucian ethos actually fits in well with Western philosophies surrounding things nationalism and very vertical social and economic hierarchies.

Uhm. I pretty sure that FL had one of the best data reporting. Until lately that is, which is unfortunate. But even now there is no really lack of transparency, but lag. I don't really see why an additional week of lag is that big of problem.

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

The scariest part of this to me is Florida, because it's more vaccinated than the national average and things are still getting this bad there.  Does not bode well at all for the North in Oct-Dec!  Really hope they crank out those boosters promptly and efficiently, because I suspect no state has reached herd immunity yet.

This is a horribly misleading way, bordering on intentional, of looking at it as the states that are in the 30s-% range are dragging down the national average. The entire Northeast is at or above 70% while Florida is only at 50%--and bear in mind it's only just now reaching that 50% mark, and things were terrible there before that. Not to mention they're a resort state who is acting as if there is no covid which is a recipe for the disaster that's unfolding.

False. VT has highest rate at 67% fully vaccinated vs FL 51%. NY has 58%, and DC has 56%. So FL has similar level comparing with bigger NE states.

Smaller NE states are better, esp if you look at vaccination of older population. Among 65+ VT has 99% (!!), ME has 98% vs Floridas 87%, though slightly better than NY 86% or DC 83%.

I wonder what % of vaccination among medical/nursing home etc personal is. Suspect, that for example NY has higher than FL. Would explain a lot.

Another reasons FL is now hit harder than for instance NY, are climate and that (D) Cuomo already managed to kill grandmas. "Weirdly", it has never really been a big deal among Dem and their media.

If you look at EU, Spain and Portugal that have Florida'ish climate are now in top of vaccination rates and are very good at vaccinating older population (66% of all ages and 92% of 40+ are fully vaccinated, so better than VT) . They've been very strict on useless mask etc, still they are now hit (death per capita) ~20 times harder than Scandinavia that followed science and barely use masks at all.

https://ig.ft.com/coronavirus-vaccine-tracker

I'll agree that climate would explain a lot of the original dynamic. However, it only really appears to be an obstacle at first. Brazil and India have climates like Miami and they started out OK but not now are taking in the whole thing.

US and Western Europe are much more similar. There is no doubt that Covid is seasonal, probably depending on people being outside/inside.

The other reason of Portugal/Spain's fall is the re-opening of turism. Forget to mention it. Don't know much about turism in US, though.

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

I keep reading reports about more and more severe case among fully vaccinated people.

Not like “many people are saying…”

Just different things, from celebs and other people I personally know or acquaintances/friends/family of people that I know.

95% != 100%

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

https://twitter.com/NateSilver538/status/1428771522190077953
https://twitter.com/NateSilver538/status/1428794625909612546

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

https://twitter.com/JonLemire/status/1429800811010445314


Finally.

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

https://twitter.com/NateSilver538/status/1429465330284384256

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1429823392992145416

You and so called "journalist" Rupar mean it's a bad journalism, don't you? JC.

Unfortunately, there are a lot people who still believes in conspiracy about "rushed" vaccines that Democrats invented in order to steal the election from Trump. Fox acknowledges these worries, and then [the guest] pedagogically explains how the process looks like, why it took as much time as it took and why it's a good news.

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

Yeah, if you've been spending more of your time on criticizing FL than NY, NJ and MI, you're a hack.

It was similar last year.

FL got hit hard during Summer - DeathSantis.
MI, IL and CA got hit, perhaps, even harder during Fall/Winter - radio silence.

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

Yeah, if you've been spending more of your time on criticizing FL than NY, NJ and MI, you're a hack.

It was similar last year.

FL got hit hard during Summer - DeathSantis.
MI, IL and CA got hit, perhaps, even harder during Fall/Winter - radio silence.

Real test will be whether CA/NE get hit this winter.
Whether Florida gets hit again next summer.

If North East mostly escapes and this happens again next summer, I suspect that is the scenario where DeSantis is in trouble for reelection. He can survive this if it is in fact the final wave. But if herd immunity is achieved through natural immunity which fades after 9 months, and everyone gets reinfected again next summer and you have 100+ deaths a day going into 2022 elections then there is a huge problem.

That said DeSantis created a lot of his own PR problems here. Had he stopped at opposing lockdowns, blocking enforcement of those, and then let local school boards hang themselves on unpopular mask mandates while also avoiding a clash with Disney/Cruise lines he would be at 60%+. He went in 125% on a winning strategy and ended up taking the fall for things which were entirely foreseeable*

* the blocking of daily data releases on June 4th was an astronomical blunder for all the reasons you note. He proclaimed that Covid was over and therefore there was no need to even monitor it weeks before he should have known a wave was coming and when one was already building in Missouri. Furthermore, he handed control over the narrative, and Florida's daily numbers to the Biden CDC.

DeSantis has played Covid horribly since about May of 2021. Whether that makes him responsible for many if any deaths is more debatable. But virtually all the political damage he is suffering is self-inflicted by really stupid decisions anyone with a room temperature IQ could see would play out the way they did.

Addendum to that. Urban legends about Vaccines causing autism meant a generation of parents whose kids developed symptoms of autism and had a vaccine blamed vaccines for it. Because they like blaming things. Long Covid has horribly defined symptoms which basically include any symptoms of Autism, ADHD, or even being teenager, namely moodyness, low energy, sleeping in, lack of motivation. DeSantis may not have given a single kid long covid. But there are going to be tens of thousands of mothers of whom thousands will be willing to go on TV and in effect say DeSantis crippled my child and gave them ADHD.

There is no requirement for any evidence masks work. All that will be needed is the kid showing any symptoms whatsoever, and for the kid to have tested positive for covid and DeSantis personally will have crippled their kid.

I do think that they will mostly escape it. Simply, because they will be hit later, when more people get vaccinated.

As I said the states, I mentioned, got hit harder then FL in terms of death per capita, despite DeSantis "stupid" policies and Democratic great [anti-]science policies.

The only thing that really matters is the vaccination rate (among older pop). Let's take a look at top 5 states by death per capita.

The Top 5 state by death per capita (all time) are

(D) NJ 301 per 100,000
(D) NY 276
(R) MS 269
(D) MA 264
(D) RI 260

Florida has 197, slightly over US average of 189 per 100,000. Despite much  older population

Vaccination rate

...........65+ at least 1.... 65+, fully.....All, fully
(D) NJ ....92%................85%................60%
(D) NY ...89%................82%................59%
(R) MS ...81%................74%................37%
(D) MA ...98%................88%................65%
(D) RI ....97%................93%................64%

(R) FL 94%....................82%.................52%


So MA and especially RI are clearly better, though not THAT much. NJ and NY are just slightly better, but they almost 50% more overall death per capita.


Did DeSantis "play" it badly? Well, yeah. He was taken totally aback by Delta. Still, most damage came because of biased media. Did (D) Edwards get similar coverage despite Louisiana having even worse #'s right now (though FL will get worse soon enough) and even worse vaccination rate?

Spoiler alert! Click Show to show the content.

Show

By the way, Biden didn't "play" it well, either. https://apnorc.org/projects/fewer-approve-of-bidens-handling-of-the-pandemic/

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

Yeah, if you've been spending more of your time on criticizing FL than NY, NJ and MI, you're a hack.

It was similar last year.

FL got hit hard during Summer - DeathSantis.
MI, IL and CA got hit, perhaps, even harder during Fall/Winter - radio silence.

Real test will be whether CA/NE get hit this winter.
Whether Florida gets hit again next summer.

If North East mostly escapes and this happens again next summer, I suspect that is the scenario where DeSantis is in trouble for reelection. He can survive this if it is in fact the final wave. But if herd immunity is achieved through natural immunity which fades after 9 months, and everyone gets reinfected again next summer and you have 100+ deaths a day going into 2022 elections then there is a huge problem.

That said DeSantis created a lot of his own PR problems here. Had he stopped at opposing lockdowns, blocking enforcement of those, and then let local school boards hang themselves on unpopular mask mandates while also avoiding a clash with Disney/Cruise lines he would be at 60%+. He went in 125% on a winning strategy and ended up taking the fall for things which were entirely foreseeable*

* the blocking of daily data releases on June 4th was an astronomical blunder for all the reasons you note. He proclaimed that Covid was over and therefore there was no need to even monitor it weeks before he should have known a wave was coming and when one was already building in Missouri. Furthermore, he handed control over the narrative, and Florida's daily numbers to the Biden CDC.

DeSantis has played Covid horribly since about May of 2021. Whether that makes him responsible for many if any deaths is more debatable. But virtually all the political damage he is suffering is self-inflicted by really stupid decisions anyone with a room temperature IQ could see would play out the way they did.

Addendum to that. Urban legends about Vaccines causing autism meant a generation of parents whose kids developed symptoms of autism and had a vaccine blamed vaccines for it. Because they like blaming things. Long Covid has horribly defined symptoms which basically include any symptoms of Autism, ADHD, or even being teenager, namely moodyness, low energy, sleeping in, lack of motivation. DeSantis may not have given a single kid long covid. But there are going to be tens of thousands of mothers of whom thousands will be willing to go on TV and in effect say DeSantis crippled my child and gave them ADHD.

There is no requirement for any evidence masks work. All that will be needed is the kid showing any symptoms whatsoever, and for the kid to have tested positive for covid and DeSantis personally will have crippled their kid.

I do think that they will mostly escape it. Simply, because they will be hit later, when more people get vaccinated.

As I said the states, I mentioned, got hit harder then FL in terms of death per capita, despite DeSantis "stupid" policies and Democratic great [anti-]science policies.

The only thing that really matters is the vaccination rate (among older pop). Let's take a look at top 5 states by death per capita.

The Top 5 state by death per capita (all time) are

(D) NJ 301 per 100,000
(D) NY 276
(R) MS 269
(D) MA 264
(D) RI 260

Florida has 197, slightly over US average of 189 per 100,000. Despite much  older population

Vaccination rate

...........65+ at least 1.... 65+, fully.....All, fully
(D) NJ ....92%................85%................60%
(D) NY ...89%................82%................59%
(R) MS ...81%................74%................37%
(D) MA ...98%................88%................65%
(D) RI ....97%................93%................64%

(R) FL 94%....................82%.................52%


So MA and especially RI are clearly better, though not THAT much. NJ and NY are just slightly better, but they almost 50% more overall death per capita.


Did DeSantis "play" it badly? Well, yeah. He was taken totally aback by Delta. Still, most damage came because of biased media. Did (D) Edwards get similar coverage despite Louisiana having even worse #'s right now (though FL will get worse soon enough) and even worse vaccination rate?

Spoiler alert! Click Show to show the content.

Show

By the way, Biden didn't "play" it well, either. https://apnorc.org/projects/fewer-approve-of-bidens-handling-of-the-pandemic/

I think DeSantis's policy last summer and fall was by and large vindicated. In fact, had he followed it this summer, ie. said yes we are going to get hit what we need is

1. People to make smart choices
2. State to enable those choices by providing maximum possible information(ie. opposite of what he did with ending daily updates) and urging masking/vaccines while stating categorically that coercion does not work and lockdowns do not work

I think he would have been hailed as a hero by all except the really extreme karens. Ie. He would have been seen as aggressively pushing personal responsibility, and providing a model of a government which enabled decision making.

DeSantis' errors political are self-inflicted. Despite the alarmism here, they have killed far fewer people than Cuomo's and I suspect less than the J/J screwup. But, they indicate a distinct lack of political foresight and judgement which is why I feel they say a lot about his prospects as a future presidential  candidate. Another wave was clearly coming and from about May onwards DeSantis did pretty much every single thing wrong politically. And he has given cover to other people whose mistakes likely killed a lot more people, or are even more scientifically illiterate(hello Kate Brown).

DeSantis' actual handling of Covid19 is not the disaster liberals like to portray it as.

His political handling of it, far from indicating he is some sort of messiah, as some Republicans seem to have wished him to be, on the other hand, has shown he is a one trick pony.

Yeah, I mostly agree. He gambled on that it's over regardless and lost badly. I think, too, he'd be too toxic in 2024, because of this. But it's 2 years away.

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

I wonder though what happens if/when a Republican state does exceed us in deaths per capita? What's the new deflection and excuse going to be?

Shows how you, guys, are used to biased coverage. Republicans have to come up with "deflections" and "excuses" despite having less deaths per capita. Incredible. If top 3 worst states were governed by Republicans, they'd be f**cked by media 24/7/365.

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

F[inks]ing YIKES.

https://twitter.com/AP/status/1430546392288841732?s=19
New York really just had an exorcism.

This is not especially relevant to this thread, but it's really, really unfortunate that Democratic infighting resulting from ambitious NY Dems wanting to take down Cuomo has handed the pro-COVID forces a propaganda victory. Who knows what similar investigations in Florida or Texas might reveal about their pandemic handling, but there, the Republicans stand united insisting the pandemic is a Democratic hoax and other such nonsense, and would stonewall and shut down any attempt at investigation.

See, a fairly typical (D) response that proves my point.

Who knows what similar investigations in Florida or Texas might reveal about their pandemic handling

I've seen this batsh**t crazy conspiracy during the whole pandemic. "Republicans're just better at covering up the deaths!!!!!!!1111oneoneone". It's get debunked every time, but  memory span of conspiracy theorists is quite short.

Science knows. You have excessive mortality data. It's not a perfect, but it is one of the best methods to reveal hidden covid deaths. Unless you think that DeSantis and Abbot conspired to fake this data, too...


https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/03/31/actually-data-dont-suggest-anything-unusual-about-floridas-excess-death-toll/
Actually, the data don’t suggest anything unusual about Florida’s excess death toll

For months, critics of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) have suggested that his administration is underreporting the effects of the coronavirus pandemic in his state. The high-profile firing of (and subsequent investigation into) Florida’s top data manager contributed to such questions. Shortly before the 2020 election — in which DeSantis’s political ally, President Donald Trump, was being judged in part on his pandemic response — the state’s reported death numbers suddenly dropped.

DeSantis’s habit of leaning into criticism from his political opponents has heightened scrutiny of how the pandemic is unfolding in his state. But, overall, the numbers from Florida aren’t much different from other places, muddying efforts to cast DeSantis as incompetent or nefarious.

Given all of that, it’s not surprising that a report from Yahoo News alleging that the number of deaths reported in the state was undercounted was embraced by the governor’s critics. Former governor (and former Republican) Charlie Crist, who’s exploring a run for his old job, declared on Twitter that DeSantis “was likely hiding thousands of positive COVID cases,” linking to the article.

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

Report also asserts Covid was not a biological weapon and China did not have foreknowledge before the initial outbreak in Wuhan.

"Asserts" is somewhat too big word for that. It's better to just link to 2(two!)-page summary written in plain simple English. More precisely, they use words "judge" and "asses" to describe that.

https://www.dni.gov/files/ODNI/documents/assessments/Unclassified-Summary-of-Assessment-on-COVID-19-Origins.pdf

We judge the virus was not developed as a biological weapon. Most agencies also assess with low confidence that SARS-CoV-2 probably was not genetically engineered; however, two agencies believe there was not sufficient evidence to make an assessment either way. Finally, the IC assesses China’s officials did not have foreknowledge of the virus before the initial outbreak of COVID-19 emerged.

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

New Florida data release comes out tomorrow

Hope to see Broward's positivity rates decline for a second week

Florida Data Release came out!

Great news inside, with positivity rates plummeting statewide.

Cumulative Confirmed Cases: 3,179,714

JUL 29 - 2,591,381 (+110,455 New Weekly, +4.45%) (18.9% Positivity Rate)
AUG 05 - 2,726,268 (+134,887 New Weekly, +5.21%) (19.6% Positivity Rate)
AUG 12 - 2,877,729 (+151,461 New Weekly, +5.56%) (19.8% Positivity Rate)
AUG 19 - 3,027,965 (+150,236 New Weekly, +5.22%) (20.1% Positivity Rate)
AUG 26 - 3,179,714 (+151,749 New Weekly, +5.01%) (16.8% Positivity Rate)

Cumulative Confirmed Deaths: 43,979

As for deaths, I'll just show you all the graph, and not the actual numbers, because the numbers, they just don't add up. There's a lack of data here, so older deaths are constantly being added onto the logs, and not all the newer deaths are here yet.

However, this idea that deaths peaked two weeks ago we have seen signs of in the last report as well. Very good to see!

Image Link

Wouldn't call it great tbh. What's about new deaths per age group? Is there info about nursing homes related deaths?

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

https://twitter.com/business/status/1431139669970980866
Previous Covid Prevents Delta Infection Better Than Pfizer Shot

eople who recovered from a bout of Covid-19 during one of the earlier waves of the pandemic appear to have a lower risk of contracting the delta variant than those who got two doses of the vaccine from Pfizer Inc. and BioNTech SE.

The largest real-world analysis comparing natural immunity -- gained from an earlier infection -- to the protection provided by one of the most potent vaccines currently in use showed that reinfections were much less common. The paper from researchers in Israel contrasts with earlier studies, which showed that immunizations offered better protection than an earlier infection, though those studies were not of the delta variant.

The results are good news for patients who already successfully battled Covid-19, but show the challenge of relying exclusively on immunizations to move past the pandemic. People given both doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine were almost six-fold more likely to contract a delta infection and seven-fold more likely to have symptomatic disease than those who recovered.

“This analysis demonstrated that natural immunity affords longer lasting and stronger protection against infection, symptomatic disease and hospitalization due to the delta variant,” the researchers said.

People given both doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine were almost six-fold more likely to contract a delta infection and seven-fold more likely to have symptomatic disease than those who recovered.


Anti-vaxxers, drinking de-wormers, are gonna be like: ooh ah, ooh ah, yeah, ooh ooh!


Disclaimer: it's a pre-print that hasn't been peer-reviewed yet.

The data was posted as a preprint article on medRxiv, and hasn’t yet been reviewed by other researchers.

Link to the study https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.08.24.21262415v1.full.pdf

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

As WSJ article rightfully states the EU "ban" is based on soaring #s of cases, not on vaccination rate (even if it likely matters as well). USA (and UK) has 4 times more cases per capita than EU. Cases in US/UK keeps soaring, while they are stable/slowly declining in EU.

Spoiler alert! Click Show to show the content.

Show

Another reason is quite ironic:

Pressure to remove the U.S. from the travel list has also increased because Washington has maintained a ban on European nonessential travel to the U.S.

The EU decision, taken in June, to allow U.S. travelers to visit was one of a number of actions in Washington and Europe to reset relations after tensions under the Trump administration. It came shortly after President Biden visited Brussels to speak with EU leaders.

Murica is back!

As so often with Biden's corona politic, it's a theater. Ironically, he was against the bans, when it really mattered.

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

https://twitter.com/MorningConsult/status/1432453077198675978

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

Is there info about nursing homes related deaths?

Well...

https://www.miamiherald.com/news/coronavirus/article253524984.html
Florida nursing homes have low staff vaccination rates. Resident cases and deaths are rising.

The most dramatic COVID-19 case increases this summer have occurred in states with low rates of vaccinated workers, such as Florida, where an estimated 47.5% of nursing home staff were fully vaccinated as of Aug. 15 — lower than the national average of vaccinated staff per facility (61.1%) and the lowest of any state, according to the most recent data reported by the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services or CMS.

About 70,000 people live in a nursing home in Florida, where the rate of fully vaccinated residents per facility — 73.1% — is lower than every other state except Nevada, which reported a resident vaccination rate of 71.7% per nursing home as of Aug. 15. The national average of vaccinated residents per nursing home is 83.1%.

As Florida nursing homes lag behind their peers in resident and staff vaccination rates, the number and rate of new COVID cases for residents and staff of the state’s more than 700 nursing homes spiked in July and early August

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

Two Top F.D.A. Vaccine Regulators Are Set to Depart During a Crucial Period
The announcement that Dr. Marion Gruber and Dr. Philip Krause will leave this fall comes as the agency conducts sensitive reviews of coronavirus vaccines for children and booster shots.

WASHINGTON — Two of the Food and Drug Administration’s top vaccine regulators will leave the agency this fall, a development that could disrupt its work on deciding whether to recommend coronavirus vaccines for children under 12 and booster shots for the general population.

Dr. Marion Gruber, the director of the F.D.A.’s vaccines office, will retire at the end of October, and her deputy, Dr. Philip Krause, will leave in November, according to an email that Dr. Peter Marks, the agency’s top vaccine regulator, sent to staff members on Tuesday morning. One reason is that Dr. Gruber and Dr. Krause were upset about the Biden administration’s recent announcement that adults should get a coronavirus booster vaccination eight months after they received their second shot, according to people familiar with their thinking.

Neither believed there was enough data to justify offering booster shots yet, the people said, and both viewed the announcement, amplified by President Biden, as pressure on the F.D.A. to quickly authorize them.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/31/us/politics/fda-vaccine-regulators-booster-shots.html

Imagine the outrage, if "Two Top F.D.A. Vaccine Regulators" resigned because of pressure from Trump... Anti-science Drumpf.

I fear, it will be used by anti-vaxers.