Jill writes:

Hello Dr. Griffin,

I love your clinical updates, and listen attentively each week.

I was a little disappointed by your segment on

 “Past SARS-CoV-2 infection protection against re-infection “

I was very happy to hear that you were going to address this article, as my husband had heard chatter about it at work and online. I think you are understandably frustrated and exhausted by vaccine skeptics- but I think you overlooked the main question. I think it is clear that you should not get COVID to avoid COVID= but the question is – “Is there a benefit to getting vaccinated or boosted if you already had COVID”. My whole family is completely vaccinated and boosted, and luckily, we have not yet contracted the virus, but our next door neighbor got COVID and then was saying that now he doesn’t need to get the vaccine. It would be nice if you could articulate a clear, science-based response to this argument. 

Thank you so much!

Jill

Durham, NC 

Nikki writes:

Should we be assessing patients for quinoa allergy before vaccinating with a saponin adjuvanted vaccine? The FDA lists saponin on the Novovax fact sheet, but most patients and vaccinators will not correlate saponin with quinoa.  You also mentioned saponin in a future adjuvanted RSV vaccine.

Thank you,

Nikki

Sharron writes:

Dear Dr Daniel,

My fully vaccinated and boosted 78 yo husband has a mechanical aortic heart valve requiring the use of Coumadin. He is prediabetic on Metformin along with stable stage 3a kidney disease and has had a mild heart attack and has a pacemaker. He has moderate Parkinson’s treated with Rytary. He is a complex patient that is amazingly vigorous in spite of his conditions. 

What course of treatment would be recommended for him if he catches covid?

I always enjoy your podcasts.

Thank you,

Sharron

Carol writes:

Remdesivir has been trending on Twitter. There are numerous tweets along the lines of, “My Grandma tested positive for covid while in the hospital for something else, but all she had was cold symptoms (or was asymptomatic). The doctor gave her remdesivir. Her kidneys shut down, and now she’s dead. Remdesivir killed my grandma”, or they imply s/he was in the inflammation stage and they gave her remdesivir. I suspect several people are just plain lying. What’s actually going on? Are doctors prescribing remedivir at the wrong time or when it’s not needed? If so, are they doing this for the profit motive? It seems that an awful lot of people are rejecting effective new drugs because they don’t trust hospitals, doctors, “big pharma”, etc. I know from too much personal experience that doctors don’t always know what they’re talking about, hospitals are for-profit institutions that will rip you off if they can, and that they make more money from Medicare for covid treatments. I don’t know what to say. Take a look at the top tweets on remdesivir..  It’s maddening.

 Great episode last week.  Thanks,

Carol