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Before I give the answer....a few facts.
Most of us carry around a multitude of viruses and bacteria that happily co-exist with each other, interact with our own bodies (and others), boosting our immune system....occasionally we get poorly, recover and get stronger....most of us will only die of old age, our bodies just worn out from overuse, excessive revving.
The gardeners amongst us will last the longest, not just because we eat non-chemically-altered food, but because we immerse our hands in trillions of live bacteria every day, simply sloshing our hands around in a cold rain-water bucket before downing another beer.....minute doses of new immunity every day.
So, the better our immune system, the more prepared we are to fight off a new corona (crown)-type virus....and the complete opposite proves the point ie those with immune-deficient bodily systems like HIV or AIDS can die from the simplest of diseases unless they get immediate medical intervention.
The Oldies amongst us will naturally die first, we know that, but if we have now stopped smoking and allowed our lungs to at least partially repair themselves, live outside the industrial areas and breathe cleaner air, eat non-chemical food, non-fatty foods, fresh greens, 30 minutes of exercise per day etc etc....our chances will get better of surviving old-age and these newly-emerging viruses.....ideally get back to the land and live with nature
......but what happens to us Oldies if our immune systems were giving an additional boost in our youth?.
Death rates in Europe, persons dying from Covid19 per million of population (IMO infection rates do not matter as the vast majority of people are surviving which is great news for the "herd" immunity bank. They are only relevant for not overloading hospitals and managing the return from lockdown back to a mobile society 6 months or a year from now?), so Death Rates in a table form using today's and yesterday's Worldometer figures.
Europe's "worst 5 countries for deaths" ignoring San Marino and Andorra because of their miniscule populations ie 50 dead between them caused their ppm's to sky rocket.
Spain - 297
Italy - 283 *
Belgium - 176 *
France - 137
Holland - 123 *
Three of these "worst 5" covid-hit countries (*) also WERE THE ONLY 3 European countries to have NEVER given their school-children the UK-standard Bacille Calmette-Guérin (BCG) vaccine ie the TB jab, followed up by a booster-shot several years later, as standard.(different countries had different rules ie you could request jabs if you were in high-risk groups but Italy, Belgium and Holland never adopted the mass immunisation policy. Pulled this from the TB data world map BCG mass vaccination has never been performed in Italy, but, since the 1940s, vaccination campaigns were promoted in some areas of the country. No information about the type of vaccine and mode of administration are included in national policies. Theoretically, more than one type of vaccine can be used in different parts of the country. When the national health system was reformed in 2008 (legislative decree no. 81/2008), a number of previous policies were implicitly abrogated, including the one concerning BCG vaccination (2001), although this remains a matter of debate. )
Now the next question is what about Spain and France who are getting hit hard?
Spain had a TB vaccine policy only from 1965 to 1981 whereas it's Iberian neighbour Portugal has COMPULSORY VACCINATIONS AT BIRTH, to this day......and a covid19 death rate of only 34 ppm, 8 times lower than it's neighbour with a huge land border!!
France (137 ppm) is the only one of the "worst 5" I cannot figure out, they've had a TB programme from 1950 to 2007 though they've chopped and changed the strain of vaccine a few times 2004: Stopped revaccinations of children and adults of certain professions; 2004: Routine tuberculin tests stopped; 2006: Multipuncture (Monovax) replaced by BCG ID (BCG SSI); 2007: Compulsory vaccination suspended and replaced by targeted vaccination of high-risk children
Lastly looked at South America, where the highest death rate was in Ecuador (highlighted by Driller a few days ago)
Ecuador - 11 ppm (*)
Brazil - 3
Chile - 2
Peru - 3
Argentina - 1
Columbia - 1
Uruguay - 2
.....and lo and behold, Ecuador is the only South American country not to currently have a universal TB jab (found some old medical papers showing vaccination in the past, 1961? but unclear when universally abandoned)
Interactive world map here, shows current and past BCG-TB policy....hover cursor and click on country
http://www.bcgatlas.org/
Peer-reviewed paper on BCG-TB World policy https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3062527/
Wiki details on BCG here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BCG_vaccine quote Italy: BCG mass vaccination has never been performed in Italy.
4,000 Australian hospital workers to be trialled with the TB jab Clinical trials begin in Australia
A team of Australian researchers announced on Friday that they have started testing the tuberculosis vaccine on a large scale to see if it can protect healthcare staff from the coronavirus.
About 4,000 Australian hospital workers will participate in the clinical trial that will seek to determine if the tuberculosis vaccine can reduce symptoms of COVID-19, researchers at the Murdoch Institute in Melbourne said.
https://www.euronews.com/2020/04/06/...-for-a-century
Summary - There is no conclusive evidence that a simple TB shot in our youth (I've still got my scar on my arm) was, or is, the answer but common sense tells us that any boosting of our general immune system in our childhood should help the general spread of diseases and help our chances of survival...that's just Nature's way of helping us to stay alive and building up our innate and adaptive immune system.....maybe, just maybe, the TB shot all those years ago, forced our body to recognise it was under attack and built a defense mechanism, now "stored in our genetic memory-bank".....it was worth a few hours reading for me anyway, interesting stuff.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Innate_immune_system
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Innate_immune_system
Last edited by SwalePie; 07-04-2020 at 07:56 PM.
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Some interesting points raised there Tarkers. I’ve not checked today’s figures yet but if the UK’s deaths per 1m population are still low compared to Spain and Italy etc then there could be something in it, endorsed by the trials in Australia. Something worth keeping an eye on.
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I don't know much about the TB jab (I must have had one), but I do think there is something to be said about today's sterile society causing more problems than it solves. If everything has always been squeaky clean, the first time you come into contact with a germ, bug or virus it will knock you for six. I think exposure to some of the nasties at an early age will help your body to build resistance to fight them off next time.
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Totally agree. When babies are born and as they grow through childhood their immune systems are designed to be on high alert, ready and waiting to experience and learn from all the environmental threats around them, but if those threats are sanitised out of society their immune systems never get trained and can go haywire, whether that means not being responsive enough to real threats, or overreacting to conditions that are benign, as we see with things like pet allergies.Originally Posted by Elite_Pie
I remember a professor of dermatology told me many years ago about an interesting research project in which he was involved in Cape Town, South Africa. I'm simplifying the story but the essence was that they looked at the incidence of eczema in a middle class neighbourhood where children grew up in relatively sanitary conditions and found it to be quite high, while only a few miles down the road in a shanty town area where children were growing up in relative squalor it was virtually nil. The study was still ongoing at the time of the conversation but all the evidence was pointing towards the conclusion that the kids in the relatively unhygienic conditions were developing healthy, proportionate, mature immune systems while those in the artificially clean areas were not, leading to autoimmune conditions of varying degrees of severity that could potentially last throughout adulthood.
Last edited by jackal2; 07-04-2020 at 11:52 PM.
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Guess which other country has no compulsory vaccination for TB?.....HIGHLIGHTED IN GREEN HERE
http://www.bcgatlas.org/
They moved from 1,255 deaths PER DAY yesterday to the staggering figure of 1,919 today....IN ONE DAY, 10,871 dead to 12,790.....I repeat this figure of deaths per day....almost 2,000....yes, the USA....if you click on the country, it says BCG recommendation only for specific groups or none at all....they have never had a vaccination program for TB.
Was it honestly that simple?......trigger a vaccine response as a small child to a disease that 30% of the population carry around as normal....2 billion of us carry around the several strains of TB.....I'm still not sure (I'm just a lonely goatherder, not a scientist) but it's starting to look more likely as each day passes.
Quote - About a third of the world's population, or around 2 billion people, carry the TB bacteria but most never develop the active disease.
https://www.who.int/3by5/TBfactsheet.pdf
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The figures are horrible. However if you drill down into them by socio economic group it is the lower socio economic groups who are much harder hit in particular black people. This is something of a sweeping statement but I would expect lower socio economic groups to live in less sanatised conditions as they have less money to clean etc. This makes something of a mockery of Jackals statement above ( no offense Jackal). I am not sure what the stats are on older folks being less likely to have the TB jab perhaps there is a correlation there as well.
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Q, whereabouts can I find info on US deaths by ethnicity or socio-economic groups?....genuinely interested.
Personally I would expect US deaths to include the poor first ie those without health insurance.
If I was a rich White dude with a 2 million dollar life insurance policy and a gold-standard all-state health policy, it stands to reason I would expect to be treated on hand-n-foot, whereas if I was black street hustler from Baltimore, I'd probably get run over by the rich dude's ambulance as I was coughing my guts up outside Camden Yards.
I spent 3 years there, and the first thing they ask for is your health insurance....or your credit card.
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What about those of us who have actually had TB are we more at risk or dosn't it matter
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I worked down t'pit for twenty years. No bogs down there and some coaling districts several miles from the shafts so you were stuck down there for eight hours. Have a slash anywhere or a crap where you fancy then bury it upwind from your mates, just for a laugh. Nowhere to wash your hands either. Don't ask about eating your snap. Healthiest bunch of men I ever worked with and that includes ten years on building sites.
Maggie shut my pit personally and I then worked for a company "Never knowingly undersold", squeaky clean, medical staff and not a microbe in sight. I regularly saw people with colds and imaginary 'flu still coming to work and spreading their germs hither and thither, but not to me and a few others. We got talking and it turned out we all were ex-colliers or some species of outdoor worker. I'm 72 and still as healthy as a freshly fcuked flea. Broke me ankle though.
Last edited by LaxtonLad; 08-04-2020 at 06:48 AM.
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I read it here but its not actual stats its news https://www.washingtonpost.com/polit...8f8_story.html
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