Vaccine Progress, Approval, and Deployment

[hwl]

and knowing that the numbers are better for the Pfizer one,

The reduction in hospitalisation stats are actually better for both Oxford/AZ and Moderna than Pfizer and that is arguably what matters the most in the near term. The general efficacy of the Oxford/AZ, Pfizer and Moderna vaccines were all measure in different ways so aren't directly comparable.

 

[takno]

The reduction in hospitalisation stats are actually better for both Oxford/AZ and Moderna than Pfizer and that is arguably what matters the most in the near term. The general efficacy of the Oxford/AZ, Pfizer and Moderna vaccines were all measure in different ways so aren't directly comparable.

Thanks for the correction - I was just rolling with the headline stats from before Christmas. I don't expect to be offered any of them for a few months yet, let alone being expected to make a choice

 

[hwl]

Thanks for the correction - I was just rolling with the headline stats from before Christmas. I don't expect to be offered any of them for a few months yet, let alone being expected to make a choice

The key bit is zero hospitalisations more than 2 weeks of first dose with Oxford/AZ or Moderna (inevitable that someone in the vaccinated groups will be hospitalised at some point but not so far...)
There were 2 hospitalisations with the Oxford vaccine with PCR tests samples for the 2 cases taken at 2 and 10 days post first jab.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

The early work on the new strain suggested a reasonable reinfection rate for those who had previously had it 90+days before, hence reinfection may be more common for all strains than expected. (Previously there were question over whether the original infection had just come back but the new strain presented some interesting scientific opportunities.

The antibody sampling testing in London was just short of 20% last time but that doesn't seem to be helping too much at the moment!

Indeed I'd say this is worrisome as surely by now this would be providing some level of moderation especially in London and initially it looked that way in early Autumn but clearly not with current situation so I do hope SAGE have instructed experts and modellers to look at this.

 

[hwl]

Indeed I'd say this is worrisome as surely by now this would be providing some level of moderation especially in London and initially it looked that way in early Autumn but clearly not with current situation so I do hope SAGE have instructed experts and modellers to look at this.

SAGE and PHE were aware before Christmas and on the case.

 

[duncanp]

Wasn't the whole point of the vaccine always that it stopped you getting serious covid? Of course you can still get an infection, but it means your body will be able to fight it more effectively.

The BBC really are doing some irresponsible reporting.

No vaccine can prevent you from becoming infected, because vaccination does not stop you breathing in virus laden aerosols, or touching an infected surface and then touching your eyes or nose afterwards.

But a vaccine should improve the probability of your having a less serious outcome if you are infected.

It has been reported that The Queen and Prince Philip have now been vaccinated. No doubt someone will moan about them jumping the queue, but they both must be in the top priority group due to their ages.

Covid-19: Queen and Prince Philip receive vaccinations

The vaccines were administered on Saturday by a household doctor at Windsor Castle, a royal source says.

www.bbc.co.uk

The Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh have received Covid-19 vaccinations, Buckingham Palace has said.

A royal source said the vaccinations were administered on Saturday by a household doctor at Windsor Castle.

The source added the Queen decided to let it be known she had the vaccination to prevent further speculation.

The Queen, 94, and Prince Philip, 99, are among around 1.5 million people in the UK to have had at least one dose of a Covid vaccine so far.

People aged over 80 in the UK are among the high-priority groups which are being given the vaccine first.

The couple have been spending the lockdown in England at their Windsor Castle home after deciding to have a quiet Christmas at their Berkshire residence, instead of the traditional royal family gathering at Sandringham.

Last month the Queen appeared alongside several other senior royals for the first time since the coronavirus pandemic began.

In 2020 she went seven months - between March and October - without carrying out public engagements outside of a royal residence.

During that time, her eldest child, Prince Charles, 72, contracted coronavirus and displayed mild symptoms.

Palace sources also told the BBC that her grandson Prince William tested positive in April - though Kensington Palace refused to comment officially.

 

[yorksrob]

No vaccine can prevent you from becoming infected, because vaccination does not stop you breathing in virus laden aerosols, or touching an infected surface and then touching your eyes or nose afterwards.

But a vaccine should improve the probability of your having a less serious outcome if you are infected.

It has been reported that The Queen and Prince Philip have now been vaccinated. No doubt someone will moan about them jumping the queue, but they both must be in the top priority group due to their ages.

Covid-19: Queen and Prince Philip receive vaccinations

The vaccines were administered on Saturday by a household doctor at Windsor Castle, a royal source says.

www.bbc.co.uk

Quite. It would be surprising if they hadn't had it by now, given their age.

 

[duncanp]

Quite. It would be surprising if they hadn't had it by now, given their age.

It makes me wonder if all the plans for funerals after the death of a senior member of the royal family have been revised due to COVID-19.

After all, a big ceremony where large numbers of people gather is not exactly what is needed at the moment.

 

[MattA7]

If the vaccine doesn’t stop you getting Covid (simply makes you a asymptotic case) then doesn’t that mean no heard immunity therefore no protection for those who can’t be vaccinated due to medical reasons.

most vaccines work by making the person immune so the virus doesn’t get a chance to infect as it’s quickly attacked by the immune systems antibodies.

there was unconfirmed preliminary reports that Pfizer reduced infection by 90% and transmission by 50% (although more research is needed to verify that)

 

[chris11256]

On a personal front, my wife who's a carer in a small care home(16 residents) was told this morning that she couldn't have the vaccine today(she had been told last week it was booked in for today) as there isn't enough vaccine to cover all 16 residents and the staff. She's not been told when to expect to be offered it again.

 

[hwl]

If the vaccine doesn’t stop you getting Covid (simply makes you a asymptotic case) then doesn’t that mean no heard immunity therefore no protection for those who can’t be vaccinated due to medical reasons.

most vaccines work by making the person immune so the virus doesn’t get a chance to infect as it’s quickly attacked by the immune systems antibodies.

there was unconfirmed preliminary reports that Pfizer reduced infection by 90% and transmission by 50% (although more research is needed to verify that)

The current thinking is that the lower viral load in most asymptotic cases means there is a much lower probability of transmission (expected to be 5-10% of presymptotic or symptotic cases levels for the old strains, no new strain data yet). Hence most successfully vaccinated people shouldn't transmit, then there are the unsuccessful ones and the unvaccinated people.

The Pfizer 50% transmission reduction was a "best guess" from the BioNTech CEO in November, and it will have been a safe conservative guess!

 

[island]

It makes me wonder if all the plans for funerals after the death of a senior member of the royal family have been revised due to COVID-19.

After all, a big ceremony where large numbers of people gather is not exactly what is needed at the moment.

One assumes a small ceremony with family would take place, perhaps televised, and a larger remembrance service scheduled in once it was safe to do so.

 

[MattA7]

One assumes a small ceremony with family would take place, perhaps televised, and a larger remembrance service scheduled in once it was safe to do so.

I think if there was a large ceremony that they would be a complete uproar by both pro restriction and anti restriction sides as it would come across as “don’t do as I do- do as I say” behavior.

 

[Jozhua]

My Grandad's care home had the entire home vaccinated within an hour, after notifying residents of it's availability on the day.

He's the most vulnerable person I know, so I'm happy his journey to immunity has started. Some of the workers had been vaccinated last month.

Hopefully this is a sign things are speeding up on the vaccination programme a little bit. God knows that they have to, it's now a race between covid and the vaccinations to determine how people get their immunity.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

SAGE and PHE were aware before Christmas and on the case.

What is there view then as I can't see anything on the SAGE minutes.

Generally negative papers are held back for weeks if not months if they don't support the govt narrative despite Whitty & Valance saying they should be released its the Cabinet Office that decides what papers and when they are released.

 

[hwl]

What is there view then as I can't see anything on the SAGE minutes.

Generally negative papers are held back for weeks if not months if they don't support the govt narrative despite Whitty & Valance saying they should be released its the Cabinet Office that decides what papers and when they are released.

SAGE - members having done the work themselves (and in public domain), interviews, sub committee work e.g NERVTAG and PHE work that is public. Imperial, LSTMH, PHE and ONS (sub contracted to Oxford Uni in reality) work is effectively all co-authored by multiple SAGE or sub-committee members hence it is on the table, usually 2-3 days later these papers have been read and explained to Boris /Hancock resulting in change of direction.

 

[Whistler40145]

To quicken up the vaccination process, should to the Armed Forces be brought in to handle the distribution from the manufacturers to the GP Surgeries etc?

 

[Domh245]

To quicken up the vaccination process, should to the Armed Forces be brought in to handle the distribution from the manufacturers to the GP Surgeries etc?

That isn't the bottleneck. It wouldn't speed it up the process

 

[matt]

To quicken up the vaccination process, should to the Armed Forces be brought in to handle the distribution from the manufacturers to the GP Surgeries etc?

The Armed Forces are already heavily involved in the distribution. That was why in Thursday's Number 10 Press Conference Brigadier Phil Prosser from the 101 Logistic Brigade was one of the speakers.

 

[hwl]

To quicken up the vaccination process, should to the Armed Forces be brought in to handle the distribution from the manufacturers to the GP Surgeries etc?

Boris indicated earlier in the week that they would be brought into help provide additional capacity.
The main issues is bottling and approval so speeding thing up by a few hours in some cases may not actually make that much difference.
It is probably more a case of making sure issues don't arise.

As food wholesale is quiet Tesco have offered to help using their Bookers refrigerated van and warehouses but this hasn't been taken up yet.

 

[BananaRepublic]

My wife is having her jab as I type this.
She’s mid 50’s but a key healthcare worker.
It’s Sunday lunchtime and there’s a steady flow of people coming in at our local surgery.
All very well organised and efficient.
Plenty of volunteers and healthcare staff involved in the organisation and logistics.
It’s a relatively small vaccination centre, expecting to do 250 today, but they managed 1,158 yesterday.
It’s going much better than they hoped.

 

[Simon11]

My wife is having her jab as I type this
She’s mid 50’s but a key healthcare worker.
It’s Sunday lunchtime and there’s a steady flow of people coming in at our local surgery.
All very well organised and efficient.
Plenty of volunteers and healthcare staff involved in the organisation and logistics.
It’s a relatively small vaccination centre, expecting to do 250 today, but they managed 1,158 yesterday.
It’s going much better than they hoped.

Great to hear for everyone at home and every day, the closer we hopefully get to normality!

Earlier today, Hancock also said everyone over the age of 18 would be offered a coronavirus vaccine by the autumn. He said the UK was now vaccinating more than 200,000 people a day and around a third of all over-80s had received a jab.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-55605009 , posted at 12pm

With my calculations, assuming that vaccinations centers are doing vaccinations for 12 hours a day, that means every 1 second nearly 5 people are being vaccinated in the UK which is incredible when you consider the logistics of producing and getting people in!

 

[Cdd89]

A senior NHS relative of mine has now had the jab. Apparently the major hospitals are awash with the Pfizer vaccine as it’s so hard to handle that none of the GPs want it. It comes in trays that look like pizza boxes and is defrosted the night before in batches; each vial is so fragile that if it is accidentally shaken it is useless. The other thing is that the number of doses per vial is five, but you can get six out of a vial if you’re careful.

The AZ vaccine on the other hand comes in 10 dose vials. The difficulty there is working out how to deliver it to the housebound. There is a strict rule that a vial cannot be moved to a new location (not even next door) once the rubber seal has been pierced. It is being (seriously) considered to go to said person’s house, deliver the vaccine, then collar 9 random people off the street and give it to them too.

But we do now have enough vaccine flowing in and enough to vaccinate the whole U.K. population; the rate limiting step in the UK is red tape of various sorts. There is a major liability issue with who can do the injections for example which has not yet been surmounted.

 

[kristiang85]

With my calculations, assuming that vaccinations centers are doing vaccinations for 12 hours a day, that means every 1 second nearly 5 people are being vaccinated in the UK which is incredible when you consider the logistics of producing and getting people in!

Indeed. For all the pseudoscience we've endured at times this year, hopefully what we can stand back and look with pride at is the way many different groups around the world collaborated on these vaccines and produced them in record time. With the distribution looking good too, maybe there is something worth clapping for at the end of it.

 

[matt]

Yes say what you want about previous Government action it is looking like vaccination is something they are getting right.

 

[kristiang85]

Yes say what you want about previous Government action it is looking like vaccination is something they are getting right.

Well they have to, as all of their political futures depend on it.

 

[matacaster]

Jabbing a needle into muscle does not require much training to do it safely. The simple way of avoiding grief from ambulance chasers is to say to people you can wait for a fully qualified doctor or nurse for X days or you can have one now from a student or volunteer - you do have to sign away your right to take legal action though. Its supposed to be a crisis for God's sake - petty buerocracy has to be dispensed with. Mixed wards reduce capacity - do people want to be made well or are their rights to privacy more important such that others may die?

 

[packermac]

Jabbing a needle into muscle does not require much training to do it safely. The simple way of avoiding grief from ambulance chasers is to say to people you can wait for a fully qualified doctor or nurse for X days or you can have one now from a student or volunteer - you do have to sign away your right to take legal action though. Its supposed to be a crisis for God's sake - petty buerocracy has to be dispensed with. Mixed wards reduce capacity - do people want to be made well or are their rights to privacy more important such that others may die?

The trouble is in this country you can no longer seem to sign away your rights. You do it get ill or die and some relative gets a lawyer to sue anyway.
Just look at organ donation even when people carried a donor card relatives still questioned it.

 

[MattA7]

Am I the only one who thinks it’s real bizarre that some individuals are only trusting the Oxford vaccine. Personally If I was offered the choice I would opt for Pfizer as it’s been authorized by most countries including more “trustworthy” ones and also received WHO approval.

which leads me to believe it could be down to nationalistic nonsense more than genuine safety concerns. Then again there was a uproar because some SNP politicians were refusing to call it the Oxford vaccine which is down right obnoxious behavior on their part as far as I’m concerned.

 

[kez19]

Am I the only one who thinks it’s real bizarre that some individuals are only trusting the Oxford vaccine. Personally If I was offered the choice I would opt for Pfizer as it’s been authorized by most countries including more “trustworthy” ones and also received WHO approval.

which leads me to believe it could be down to nationalistic nonsense more than genuine safety concerns. Then again there was a uproar because some SNP politicians were refusing to call it the Oxford vaccine which is down right obnoxious behavior on their part as far as I’m concerned.

That’s what laughable on the Scottish side of it, let’s remove Oxford from it, they must think public have zips up the back!

It’s ok if it came from one of the Scottish cities it be called whatever without issue!

The thing is that it should be stipulated on the Scottish Government website but of course the numpties in power forget we can Google it