Welcome, and thanks for making your first comment!
As a fellow scientist with decades of experience in the industry, I disagree with several of your claims.
First, you will never know if it really works until you run blinded clinical trials against a placebo. This is the only way to tell and that is why it’s required for any new drug/vaccine to be launched on the market.
Clinical trials are helpful for understanding whether a drug/vaccine works on the population level. But on the individual level, clinical trials are not the only way to tell. For example, you can just take an antibody test and see if it works.
You can’t just take a antibody test and see if it works.
Of course you can.
Even if there were the right antibody tests for these peptides
Anna Czarnota posted an initial protocol here. I haven’t tried it, but it seems reasonable and likely to provide useful information about one’s level of protection.
but without using rigorous scientific method, there could be many other factors why you could see a response. Like you were exposed already to the virus and didn’t know it.
The “rigorous scientific method” is not the only way to generate knowledge that allows individuals to update their priors. But setting that aside, the question of whether one’s immune response came from the vaccine or from previous exposure to the virus is not very relevant to one’s future decision making. Either way, the antibody test provides information about one’s current level of immunity, which one can use to update their risk tolerance and behaviors.
It feels like your comments are aimed at the question, “What is the best vaccine (or vaccines) to approve and mass produce for the general population?” which is a perfectly valid and important question. As things currently stand, this relies on the standard clinical trials/FDA approval process. But this process takes a long time and is prone to all sorts of delays and inefficiencies due to politics and organizational maze behaviors, during which the pandemic continues to spread. Realizing that, the radvac developers and many commenters here have been asking a different question: “What can individuals do now (or in a future pandemic) to mitigate their personal risk of being infected?”
Both questions are important, but the large organizations responsible for developing/approving new vaccines have very different incentives than individuals looking for ways to minimize their own risk of infection.
As you can tell, I’m have more of a mainstream approach to health issues. You are totally correct that delays and avoidance of risk in the development process of the pharma industry and with the government clauses personal suffering every day. And let’s not even start about the the pharmaceutical industry’s need for “commercial success” before they even start working on a disease or problem.
However, I think you may have missed my main premise, the fact that degradation is a huge hurtle in any peptide application, it is a clear fact that peptides are digested extremely quickly and therefore are very ineffective as any type of drug. You are correct that the antibody test presented could at least show if these peptides actually enter the body and if you are getting an immune response to these specific peptides. I would be very interested to hear if anyone has tried it on themselves and gotten positive results. However, the other problem here is that even if your body does develop a immune response to peptides of the virus, it does not necessarily correlate to having a immune response to the virus itself.
I can see a pathway for this method to develop immunity to the virus itself, where the virus enzymes are broken down to the peptides you have taken and have a general immunity response offering some protection. However as a scientist personally I would need to see proof before trying this method. That would start with some lab trials showing these antibodies have and affect. Then of course we are back to clinical trials which are really the only way to prove this method work. And as you note this takes a lot of time while people are suffering and dying.
So my final point is sure, you can try this method while you are waiting for the vaccine, but it definitely shouldn’t be a replacement for the vaccine. Also you should keep in mind there are still some risks of something untested and mixed up in your kitchen, but hey, I’m not stopping anyone.
Finally if you really want to protect yourself from the virus until you can get the vaccine, then I suggest you follow the swiss cheese advise.
The best way to have some level of protection is to follow the recommendations of the epidemiologists and be extremely careful about your behavior. I know a lot of people can’t do this due to work and personal reasons, but honestly if everyone were just more careful about how they act in this situation, we all would be better off.
The best way to have some level of protection is to follow the recommendations of the epidemiologists and be extremely careful about your behavior.
I would be doubtful that the best way is to listening to someone who hasn’t on their list avoiding closed spaces, ventilation and humidity (in closed spaces), avoiding touching common buttons with fingers and recommends cloth masks (as opposed to reused FFP2/3) but has cleaning/desinfection on their list a good source of information.
Then of course we are back to clinical trials which are really the only way to prove this method work.
Then why do you link to advice that recommends unproven interventions like desinfection and using gloves when serving food?
Welcome, and thanks for making your first comment!
As a fellow scientist with decades of experience in the industry, I disagree with several of your claims.
Clinical trials are helpful for understanding whether a drug/vaccine works on the population level. But on the individual level, clinical trials are not the only way to tell. For example, you can just take an antibody test and see if it works.
Of course you can.
Anna Czarnota posted an initial protocol here. I haven’t tried it, but it seems reasonable and likely to provide useful information about one’s level of protection.
The “rigorous scientific method” is not the only way to generate knowledge that allows individuals to update their priors. But setting that aside, the question of whether one’s immune response came from the vaccine or from previous exposure to the virus is not very relevant to one’s future decision making. Either way, the antibody test provides information about one’s current level of immunity, which one can use to update their risk tolerance and behaviors.
It feels like your comments are aimed at the question, “What is the best vaccine (or vaccines) to approve and mass produce for the general population?” which is a perfectly valid and important question. As things currently stand, this relies on the standard clinical trials/FDA approval process. But this process takes a long time and is prone to all sorts of delays and inefficiencies due to politics and organizational maze behaviors, during which the pandemic continues to spread. Realizing that, the radvac developers and many commenters here have been asking a different question: “What can individuals do now (or in a future pandemic) to mitigate their personal risk of being infected?”
Both questions are important, but the large organizations responsible for developing/approving new vaccines have very different incentives than individuals looking for ways to minimize their own risk of infection.
As you can tell, I’m have more of a mainstream approach to health issues. You are totally correct that delays and avoidance of risk in the development process of the pharma industry and with the government clauses personal suffering every day. And let’s not even start about the the pharmaceutical industry’s need for “commercial success” before they even start working on a disease or problem.
However, I think you may have missed my main premise, the fact that degradation is a huge hurtle in any peptide application, it is a clear fact that peptides are digested extremely quickly and therefore are very ineffective as any type of drug. You are correct that the antibody test presented could at least show if these peptides actually enter the body and if you are getting an immune response to these specific peptides. I would be very interested to hear if anyone has tried it on themselves and gotten positive results. However, the other problem here is that even if your body does develop a immune response to peptides of the virus, it does not necessarily correlate to having a immune response to the virus itself.
I can see a pathway for this method to develop immunity to the virus itself, where the virus enzymes are broken down to the peptides you have taken and have a general immunity response offering some protection. However as a scientist personally I would need to see proof before trying this method. That would start with some lab trials showing these antibodies have and affect. Then of course we are back to clinical trials which are really the only way to prove this method work. And as you note this takes a lot of time while people are suffering and dying.
So my final point is sure, you can try this method while you are waiting for the vaccine, but it definitely shouldn’t be a replacement for the vaccine. Also you should keep in mind there are still some risks of something untested and mixed up in your kitchen, but hey, I’m not stopping anyone.
Finally if you really want to protect yourself from the virus until you can get the vaccine, then I suggest you follow the swiss cheese advise.
https://my.clevelandclinic.org/-/scassets/files/org/employer-solutions/covid-19-workplace-safety-faqs.ashx
The best way to have some level of protection is to follow the recommendations of the epidemiologists and be extremely careful about your behavior. I know a lot of people can’t do this due to work and personal reasons, but honestly if everyone were just more careful about how they act in this situation, we all would be better off.
Stay safe out there!
I would be doubtful that the best way is to listening to someone who hasn’t on their list avoiding closed spaces, ventilation and humidity (in closed spaces), avoiding touching common buttons with fingers and recommends cloth masks (as opposed to reused FFP2/3) but has cleaning/desinfection on their list a good source of information.
Then why do you link to advice that recommends unproven interventions like desinfection and using gloves when serving food?