Russian x-risks newsletter spring 21

post by avturchin · 2021-06-01T12:10:32.694Z · LW · GW · 2 comments

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Despite vaccination with Russian Sputnik, I’ve got covid. It was relatively mild, but with elevated levels of D-dimer, which means higher risk of thrombosis. I am fine now.

Notwithstanding availability of vaccines, only 10 per cent of Russian population has vaccinated and the reasons is strong disbelieve in what government say. Some people wait more classical Chumakov vaccine which is built around inactivated viruses of covid, not mRNA or vectors, but its production is limited. 

Lockdowns measures are also almost absent in Russia and life looks normal. In May, the covid incidence started to grow again in Moscow, may be fuelled by new strains. 

Meanwhile, Russia accumulated largest in decades army on the west border with Ukraine in spring, and even delivery agricultural machinery was delayed because of urgent demand for railroad tracks from military. The was speculation about possible annexing of the part of Ukraine, but nothing has happened. Ukraine now got access to very effective Turkish drones and it may use them to reclaim lost land in Donbas, so Russian deployment may be a countermeasure.

Reforestation of Siberia may be not a solution for global warming, as trees have lower albedo than grass. To support grasslands in Siberia we need… mammoth, according to the director of Pleistocene park.

Russian scientists expect that the next pandemic will be from bird flu H5N8, which is slowly adapting to humans in last 10 years.

Also, the systems of dams on major Russian rivers is old and were built in Soviet time. A collapse of any such system would be very large local catastrophe; meanwhile strong floods are expected in Enisey river in June  Such catastrophe may shift public perception of hydroenergy in the world which is currently regarded as safe and renewable source.

Russian “success” in hypersonic missiles prompted Pentagon to develop its own even quicker missiles; such missiles give less time for a counterstrike decision and increase the chances of accidental nuclear war. 

The most plausible explanation of the recent UFO reports near US fleet is Russian or Chinese drones which pretend to look like alien spacecraft and spoof radars with fake images about speed and positions, thus prompting them to turn on war mode and provide valuable information, according to Drive. However, Russian drones’ development are lagging even from Turkish, so “UFOs” are less probable to be Russian drones than Chinese.

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comment by Itsnotme · 2021-06-02T15:27:15.705Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Is there anything known to be actually wrong about Sputnik vaccine except the adenovirus vector replicating sometimes? I'd think the latter is more-or-less okay if you are not very old or immuno-compromised. I live in Eastern Europe and we have a large Russian-speaking minority group, who have the same trouble - low vaccination rate and high Covid rate - for exactly the opposite reason. They trust the Russian government well enough and would be happy to get Sputnik, but often refuse the EU-approved vaccines (they are a smart crowd but no-one can avoid a grass-is-greener-on-the-other-side effect). Before the replication news I used to be slightly angry at my government for not buying Sputnik for everyone who wants it, and I still think it would be fine under some age limit. 

Replies from: avturchin
↑ comment by avturchin · 2021-06-03T13:02:04.447Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

A person who works on other vaccine, told me that Sputnik (and other similar vaccines based on vectors) generate like 2000 random antibodies and there is a chance that some of them will turn autoimmune and cause, say, encephalitis. Other types of vaccines generate antibody not the whole vector but only to spike protein, like 30 different ones, and there are less chances of autoimmune reaction.

But most people do not know these considerations. However, they had observed how government manipulated data during elections and Olympic games and are sure that they will lie again; or they believe in "Bill Gates' chip".