Tasman Medical Journal Blog Page

What is our current understanding of COVID-19?  A gigantic and possibly never-ending question.  It may appear that there is current COVID stability, but this is illusory, as new pathogenetic strains precipitating further pandemics are inevitable. What about the demand for booster innoculations?  Anti-COVID neutralising antibodies and clinical immunity produced by vaccines against SARS-CoV-2 virus are known to wane over a period of months.1  Antibody levels one booster dose after the primary series of vaccinations are fully restored but this effect also progressively declines.  Fortunately, the 3-dose regimen including RNA-based vaccines is also highly effective against severe disease and death from

War causes death, disease, destruction, despair and destitution.  It is a valid topic for inclusion in a medical journal. Spare a momentary thought for Mr Vladimir Putin.  He does not seem to realise that by invading Ukraine he may have signed his own death warrant.  A week ago he might have expected to live a full life, notwithstanding earlier adventures, and he appears not to realise that violent adventurism based on lies only ends in tragedy.  Mother Russia, whom he is indulging, exists only in the creative minds of Russian romantics.  How do we respond as doctors to such an

This Journal, in an early publication from the pen of the Editor (1) and at a point prior to the availability of vaccines against SARS-CoV-2 infection during which lockdown of citizens was taken to be the only possible mechanism for reducing community spread of the virus, noted that the wider economic and social impacts of such measures had been overlooked.  I stated “…The natural and expected political imperative is to prevent unnecessary infections and deaths.  However, this must be balanced against the adverse chronic consequences of economic shutdown, which will produce its own health hazards, especially in the area of

The Tasman Medical Journal is politically neutral but government decisions in health based on misapplication of science and/or causing widespread community confusion justify comment as they must have health consequences.  In a previous (1) and supplementary blog we summarised information demonstrating from four studies that the Omicron strain of SARS-CoV-2 is resistant to currently available vaccines until the “booster” or 3rd dose has been administered.  A further two studies confirm that conclusion (2,3).  Thus the description of double-vaccinated persons as “fully vaccinated” is wrong for the omicron strain, which is the strain currently feared most by the WA authorities. In

Recent papers1-3 have demonstrated and confirmed that the omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2, which is now the dominant strain worldwide, is resistant to neutralising vaccinations, and that immunity from two vaccinations is poor.  On the other hand, it increases substantially after a third administration. Garcia-Beltran and his colleagues1 state that, in a study of  239 vaccinees internationally, “…Taken together, our results indicate that two-dose mRNA-based vaccines are effective at inducing neutralizing immunity to SARS-CoV-2 wild-type and Delta variants but suboptimal for inducing neutralizing responses to the Omicron variant”  but that “…recently boosted vaccinees exhibited potent neutralization of Omicron variant pseudovirus that

Atmospheric CO2  concentration is measured in parts per million, total tonnage and “emissions”.  There is a natural carbon cycle because plants can remove CO2 by photosynthesis.  It is suggested that in a “natural” world this cycle would be in equilibrium and that increasing CO2 concentrations are due directly or indirectly to human activity, either by increasing CO2 production (burning fossil fuels etc) or decreasing CO2 adsorption (by deforestation), of which the former is the greater factor.  However, this means that all sources of CO2 emissions need to be measured, and it is to be expected that the direct and indirect