COVID Film: Another Pixelation Issue

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After resolving a glaring pixelation problem in the Satanic Ram shot, I decided to go back and take a look at the opening shot. This close up shot shows how horribly pixelated the ambulance was. I decided I had to redraw each ambulance and I am now in the process of repainting each of them.

The green screen allows me to transfer animation to the final composite in After Effects. I turn off the green screen while I paint to see how the colors work with the background. Reworking the shot was also an opportunity to smooth out some of the animation timing. I left out details on the front grill since that will all be covered by headlight  beams and glow effects.

So yesterday I finished redrawing and painting the ambulance body. Today I get to paint lighting effects. Last time I transferred each of the paintings into Procreate since I like the brushing available in that program. This time I will see if I can get the same effects using the brushes in Callipeg. I will be watching videos of NYC ambulances to see the timing of the lights as they blink. With more resolution I can pay closer attention to each of the lights.

I just learned that YouTube and other social media sites censor any mention of the words “COVID” and “Pandemic”. Tic Tokers refer to it as “the “vid” or “during the panini”. With such censorship, this film will have a hard time finding an audience. I need to keep the film off of social media since many of the largest film festivals require that the screenings be a premiere. They will not show films that are being shown online. It feels awful holding the film back while festivals refuse to screen it.

Novavax was approved today. That will be my vaccine of choice to combat the new COVID variants. I asked my doctor about Novavax last time I was in for an appointment and he didn’t know what it was. The more expensive mRNA vaccines, Moderna and Pfizer only influence the spike proteins. Novavax is more like traditional vaccines and it affects the entire COVID virus.

Monetizing COVID Aid

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Republicans the filibuster to block a $10 COVID Aid bill which would have helped the Department of Health and Human Services to buy more therapeutics, vaccines and testing supplies. The federally funded free at home testing program came to s screeching halt. If you need a COVID test you have to hope your insurance will help cover the cost. Free testing is a thing of the past, now be prepared to possible pay hundreds for a nose swab.

Omicron specific vaccine boosters are becoming available for this fall. The new shots from Pfizer and Moderna are bivalent, meaning that they target both the original Covid strain and omicron’s BA.5 subvariant. To be eligible, you’ll need to have completed your primary vaccination series — and be at least two months out from your last dose of any Covid vaccine, according to the CDC.

The new shots are free of charge to receive, for now. Here’s where you can get them if you’re eligible:

  • Walgreens began offering both Pfizer and Moderna’s new boosters on Friday. The shots haven’t reached all of the chain’s locations yet, but new appointments are being added daily. You can view and schedule appointments on the Walgreens website, on the pharmacy’s app or by calling 1-800-WALGREENS.
  • CVS also began offering both updated boosters on Friday. Its online system allows you to schedule multiple patients at once, which could make it easier for your family to get vaccinated together. You can schedule those appointments on the CVS website or on the pharmacy’s app.

“The consequences of not getting COVID funding are really serious—scary, almost,” Senator Chuck Schumer said, “The rest of the world is racing to buy up the supply of these treatments and these therapeutics, and if the U.S. falls behind because of a lack of funding, vulnerable Americans, and our whole country, will pay the price.”

America has seen more deaths from COID-19 than any other county in the world with over 1 million 400,000 dead. More than 400 Americans are sill dying every day but that has become business as usual. When politician have a chance to make a difference, they choose instead to run around with their hair on fire. Your tax dollars will no longer help protect you from the next COVID wave this fall.

DeathSantis Piper

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Florida Governor Ron DeathSantis spoke against COVID-19 vaccines for young children on June 16, 2022, saying that Florida won’t provide state programs to administer vaccines for toddlers or infants. “I would say we are affirmatively against the COVID vaccine for young kids,” he said during a press conference. “These are the people who have zero risk of getting anything.” PUBLIX Supermarkets have stepped in and refuse to vaccinate children. Of course PUBLIX also helped fund the insurrection.

The Governor is of course misguided and ignoring the science. In January 2022, there were 1,150,000 cases of COVID in children in Florida. For the week ending June 23rd, nearly 68,000 child COVID-19 cases were reported. Children represented 18.8% of total accumulated cases.

Florida is the only state in the nation that didn’t order new doses of vaccines for children before the FDA decision on June 15, 2022 to approve the Pfizer and Moderna shots for kids under age 5. This week’s approval opened fast-track distribution, and kids could begin receiving shots as soon as June 21, 2022, Politico reported.

The Florida Department of Health, which is overseen by the DeatSantis office, is headed by Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo, who has been an outspoken critic of COVID-19 vaccines. He previously said he opposed vaccine use in young children and has questioned the safety and efficacy of the coronavirus vaccines, Politico reported.

Right now Florida is a COVID virus hot spot. It is the bloody skin tag of America. DeathSantis’ press secretary Christina Pushaw is staunchly anti vax and they believe that by removing a parents right to choose if their child is vaccinated, the governor could be on the road to a possible presidential bid. A few dead children is accessible collateral damage in a bid for political power.

10,144 cases of COVID-19 per day were reported in Florida in the last week.  Deaths have increased by 60 percent. Since the beginning of the pandemic, at least 1 in 3 Florida residents have been infected, for a total of 6,447,100 reported cases. Anecdotally more people I know are being infected and re-infected than at any other time during the pandemic. At least 1 in 284 residents have died from the coronavirus, a total of 75,671 deaths.

Florida ranks 46th in the nation for the highest number of children (aged 0-4 years) who died due to COVID-19 with 11 children dead. The only states with a higher death toll, are Texas with 19 children dead and California with 14 children dead. COVID-19 cases continue to rise in the U.S as DeathSantis forces death on children.

Naso Vax

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Only about 30% of Americans are fully vaccinated and boosted. That means about 70% of Americans are frightened of needles, or they are anti vax lunatics. People are tired of COVID-19. They are done with the virus although the virus is not done with us. The virus is becoming more transmissible with each new variant.

The vaccines that are available have turned the deadly COVID virus into something more akin to the common cold for the fully  vaccinated people who get infected. While these vaccines are great at protecting against severe illness and death, they cannot stop vaccinated people from contracting the virus and experiencing mild symptoms and possibly spreading the virus to others.

To help prevent mild COVID infections, what is needed are vaccines that protect us where infections start: in the mucus membranes of the nose, mouth, and throat. And for that, we are likely going to need nasal vaccines.

More than a dozen clinical trials with nasal sprays are under way, The Guardian reported, but the development process is tricky. Nasal vaccines must create an immune response but not be potent enough to make people sick. If the dose it too weak then the vaccine will not work. This sweet spot becomes even harder to find when some people already have some immunity to COVID from past infections.

A nasal vaccine could be more easily manufactured and distributed because it’s stored in a regular refrigerator rather than ultra-cold temperatures like the Moderna and Pfizer mRNA vaccines. A nasal dose could be produced for about 30 cents compared to $30 for a Moderna or Pfizer dose. Needle pansies might be more inclined to get vaccinated if they can just spray it up their nose.

Anime Superspreader

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A fully vaccinated and boosted man from Minnesota and 30 friends flew to New York City to attend an Anime Convention at the . After attending the the man tested positive for the Omicron variant of COVID-19. 15 of the others in his party also tested positive for COVID-19. It is uncertain whether any of those cases involved the Omicron variant.

The Minnesota man has recovered from mild symptoms that began shortly after the convention ended. His friends are from other states and their conditions are not yet known.

Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont reported on December 4, 2021 his state’s first case, a man in his 60s, seemed to originate from a relative of an infected man who had recently attended the anime convention. Additional family members were being tested, and both the man and his relative were fully vaccinated and experiencing only mild symptoms.

The anime convention, which drew 53 thousand people to the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center for three days, was likely a vector for spreading the new variant. Many attendees wore masks but some of the rooms were incredibly crowded with people crowded together shoulder to shoulder.

Convention attendees were required to provide proof that they had received at least one vaccine shot and they had to wear masks, according to convention web site. A single shot of Pfizer or Moderna vaccine is at most 80% effective at preventing infection. That efficacy drops with the new Omicron variant. The bottom line is that it was irresponsible to hold such a crowded convention in a pandemic.

America’s COVID-19  testing and contact-tracing efforts, have been a complete failure since the start of the pandemic so the full extent of the spread from this single convention will never be fully known. After Minnesota officials learned that the convention attendee had the Omicron variant, they informed the New York City Health Department. City health officials said that they had begun sending text messages and emails to the thousands of the anime convention’s attendees, urging them to get tested. Dr. Ted Long, who oversees the city’s contact tracing program, said that he was aware of five positive cases so far among New York City residents who attended the anime convention. The CDC is assisting the Minnesota and New York City health departments in tracking any cases, a spokeswoman said.

It is easy the Anime Convention organizers to pass the blame. Perhaps the Minnesota man and his friends were infected at a restaurant, at the hotel or on the flight. Besides these people chose to attend this superspreader event. It is their own damn fault, oh, and thanks for attending.

City Mouse

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The numbers of deaths from COVID-19 in 2021 has already surpassed the number of deaths in 2020. Urban Americas are dying half as often from COVID-19 infections compared to their  rural American counterparts.

Vaccinations are the most effective way to prevent Covid-19 infections from turning deadly. Roughly 41 percent of rural America was vaccinated as of September 23, 2021, compared with about 53 percent of urban America, according to an analysis by The Daily Yonder, a newsroom covering rural America. Limited supplies and low access made shots hard to get in the far-flung regions at first, but officials and academics now blame vaccine hesitancy, misinformation and politics for the low vaccination rates.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends a booster shot of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for some people who completed their two-dose series of the Pfizer vaccine at least six months ago. Getting fully vaccinated — including your boosters if you qualify — is the right thing to do because it protects others from getting COVID-19.

Boosters are suggested for:

  • People 65 or older
  • People who have a medical condition that puts them at high risk
  • People who work in a setting where they could be exposed to the virus like teachers and store clerks.

Only 57% of the Americans population has been fully vaccinated. Many elite city dwellers got their vaccine booster shots early by taking advantage of the nation’s vaccine surplus and loose tracking of those who have been fully vaccinated. As of August 11, 2021, 1.1 Million Americans had already gotten the booster shot. An NBC News analysis of CDC data shows that the number of people receiving booster shots is outpacing those getting their first or second doses of the initial vaccination.

On October 14, 2021 the FDA’s advisory committee will meet to discuss and potentially recommend approval of booster shots for people who received Moderna’s vaccine.

October 15, 2021  that committee will meet to potentially recommend approval of boosters for those who received Johnson & Johnson vaccine. Also, that day, the committee will discuss potentially mixing and matching vaccine boosters — that is, getting a booster that’s different from your original vaccine.

Then, about a week and a half later, on October 26, 2021 the FDA has scheduled a meeting to approve the Pfizer vaccine for children ages 5 to 11.

Vaccine by Halloween

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Yahoo News reported that, the US could authorize COVID-19 vaccines for younger kids, 5 to 11, by Halloween, Pfizer‘s new timeline suggests. The company expects to submit data to the FDA for this younger age group in early October. Pfizer is testing a lower dose of its vaccine among young kids to avoid unnecessary side effects.

The timeline might be as follows:

  • Late September 2021: Pfizer’s clinical trial will show whether the shots are safe and effective for kids ages 5 to 11.
  • Early October 2021: Pfizer will submit that trial data to the FDA.
  • Late October 2021: The FDA could authorize COVID-19 shots for emergency use among kids ages 5 to 11.
  • Early November 2021: Pfizer will submit trial data for kids between 6 months and 5 years old to the FDA.
  • Late November 2021: The FDA could authorize the shots among kids between 6 months and 5 years old.

    Moderna, meanwhile, expects to have data about its vaccine’s efficacy among young kids later in the fall or early this winter.

    Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told CNN’s Jake Tapper on September 24, 2021 that we might even see the FDA authorize both the Moderna and Pfizer shots for kids before the winter.

    Johnson & Johnson is on a slower timeline. The company won’t start studying its vaccine among children ages 12 to 17 until this fall. If the shot is shown to be safe and effective among older kids, J&J could then start enrolling 2- to 11-year-olds in its trial, followed by children younger than 2. That means a single-dose shot likely won’t be available to kids until sometime in 2022.

Breakthrough Cases

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The CDC has reported 5800 breakthrough cases of COVID-19 out of the nearly 77 million people who have been fully vaccinated. 65 percent of the cases were in women, and just over 40 percent were in people ages 60 and up. About 29% of those experiencing breakthrough infections experienced no symptoms, however, seven percent of people were hospitalized, and 74 people died.

It is unclear why asymptomatic individuals were tested for Covid-19 after being fully vaccinated. It could be that some employers, such as health care systems, require regular testing.

People are considered fully vaccinated two weeks after they receive their second dose of a two-dose vaccine, such as the Pfizer-BioNTech or the Moderna vaccines, or two weeks after a single dose of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. (Use of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine is currently paused in the U.S. as federal health officials investigate cases of rare blood clots linked to the shots.) In clinical trials, the Pfizer and the Moderna vaccines were found to be around 95 percent effective against Covid-19, and the Johnson & Johnson vaccine was 72 percent effective against moderate-to-severe illness in its U.S. trial.

“I would encourage people to continue, once they’re vaccinated, to use all the prevention measures that we’ve been talking about when they’re outside their home, including masking and distancing and whatnot. And all of that should be active in the workplace,” the CDC’s director, Dr. Rochelle Walensky, said during a briefing for the press on April 12, 2021. These breakthrough cases are another reason that people should continue to wear masks, social distance and wash hands since research is not yet in on weather they could pass the disease on to others.

Vaccination remains critical to ending the pandemic. “It does not reduce the risk to nil, but it does reduce the risk to something that we can handle.”

2021 A COVID Odyssey

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A virus anywhere in the world is a virus everywhere in the world. Wealthy nations of the world are hoarding vaccines. This has been referred to as Vaccine Nationalism or Vaccine Apartheid.

Astra Zeneca/Oxford, Pfeizer/BionTech, and Moderna said that together they will produce 5.3 billion doses of vaccine in 2021. That is enough for 3 billion people, over 1/3 of the global population.

The majority of those doses have already been set aside.  The European Union, America, Canada, Japan, and England have already pre-ordered half those doses. Canada had 9 doses for every one of its residents and the US has ordered just over 7 doses per person. These countries only account for 13% of the global population. For poorer countries there will not be much to go around. Most people in poor countries will have to wait until 2023.

There are dangers to Vaccine Nationalism. Granted rich countries will have the first access, and will begin to recover from the pandemic and economically, but the poor countries will have to wait. The virus does not respect boarders. No wall will keep it out. Counties believing they are safe while the virus rages in poor countries are very foolish. It does not work. Global economies are based on open commerce and travel. COVID-19 loves to travel. Every plane flight can ignite an outbreak anywhere in the world.

Drug patents will result in hundreds of thousands of deaths for poorer nations. South Africa and India hoped to have patents suspended for the duration of the pandemic so cheap generic vaccines could be mass manufactured for poorer countries. The motion was overruled by wealthy nations. Multinational drug companies are very effective at lobbying governments. Patents bring huge profits to the drug companies and allow then to control the prices. However these companies received billions of dollars in public funds for research and development. Profit, or death in poorer nations? The answer is easy for the richer countries. The South African variant of the virus is infecting people who have had the Pfeizer vaccine. The virus is mutating and spreading from poor countries and America is the perfect petri dish.

President Joe Biden said, “We’re going to start off and ensure Americans are taken care of first, but we’re then going to try to help the rest of the world.” He said it was clear that the pandemic would not be over until it was ended everywhere. “We’re not going to be ultimately safe, until the world is safe,” he said.

COVID Conspiracy

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Steven Brandenburg a pharmacist in Wisconsin was arrested for intentionally leaving out 57 vials of the Moderna Covid-19 vaccine from cold storage.  The viles were left them out for 12 hours, possibly rendering them useless. Each vial contained 10 doses; in total, the material was worth $8,550 to $11,400, according to a probable cause statement by Grafton police Detective Sargent Eric Sutherland.

In a probable cause statement obtained by CNN affiliate WTMJ, authorities say the pharmacist admitted to investigators he believed in conspiracy theories and believed “the COVID-19 vaccine was not safe for people and could harm them and change their DNA.”

People were given shots with the doses that had been sabotaged by the pharmacist. It is believed they will have no ill side effects from being injected with the damaged vaccine but they are likely not protected from the virus. Tests need to be done on the doses to determine if they are indeed ineffective after being removed from cold storage. The pharmacist was fired from the Advocate Aurora Health hospital system