Coronavirus: Triple Edition

[Azdeus]

So, a new mutation of Covid has been found in Danish and Swedish mink farms.

WHO is researching the new Covid mutation found in 214 individuals from June to October

English

 

Edited November 6, 2020 by Azdeus

[Gfted1]

Pfizer's New COVID-19 Vaccine Prevents 90% of Infections.

HUZZAH! Lets try it out on our oldsters ASAP!

[Gromnir]

very good news. safety data should be available at the end of the month.

best case scenario is ~25 million individuals could receive the vaccine by the end of the year. 

@Guard Dog may be particularly pleased to hear that the pharmaceutical company which distanced itself from the fed and refused to take government money for research and development is the company with the most dramatic news o' initial success... which didn't stop the current administration for taking credit for the news.

HA! Good Fun!

ps perhaps ironic, but the spike in US cases actual sped up the timeline as requisite benchmarks depended on community spread infections reaching 94 cases out of X.

[Gfted1]

Ruh roh Raggy, that leaves 15M unvaccinated! Probably superspreaders too.

[BruceVC]

2 hours ago, Gfted1 said:

Pfizer's New COVID-19 Vaccine Prevents 90% of Infections.

HUZZAH! Lets try it out on our oldsters ASAP!

And its efficacy is even higher than I was expecting for first time vaccines ....I hope it delivers but excellent news 

[Gromnir]

1 hour ago, Gfted1 said:

Ruh roh Raggy, that leaves 15M unvaccinated! Probably superspreaders too.

pfizer is producing globally, not just for the US. recollection is there is two US manufacturing locations and one in belgium. 

am honest not certain what is the % breakdown on manufacturing.

HA! Good Fun!

[Gromnir]

update:

about 10 million o' the 50 million vaccine doses available by the end o' the year will be distributed in the US. is a 2-dose vaccine. so, 5 million people in the US could be vaccinated by the end of the year... assuming the vaccine is safe and there is no major production/distribution/storage snafus. 

please continue to social distance and wear mask when you cannot maintain distance. 

HA! Good Fun!

[Gorth]

A bit of news from my old country... for those who don't know, Mink (and fur production) is big business in Denmark. Turned out that Covid19 could infect mink and that created a new, mutated strain named Cluster 5, which is resistant to antibodies that works against Covid19. I.e. effectively a mutant strain that would ignore vaccines against Covid19. Looks like Danish scientists came up with a vaccine that is also effective against this new variant.

 

"Early studies of the mutated virus strain, known as Cluster 5, showed the virus to have a reduced sensitivity towards antibodies, possibly compromising the efficacy of future vaccines, authorities said last week.

But antibodies from rabbits treated with an early-stage vaccine candidate from Denmark’s State Serum Institute (SSI) successfully beat down the Cluster 5 variant, according to Anders Fomsgaard, a leading scientist at SSI, which deals with infectious diseases.

“We couldn’t resist testing the rabbit antibodies we have against Cluster 5, and it works,” Fomsgaard told Danish broadcaster DR on Thursday."

 

https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2020/11/12/vaccine-works-against-covid-mink-mutation-in-early-testing

 

And in more local news (from my pov), The state of Victoria has now had 0 new cases the last 14 days. Looks like the draconian lock down measures did the job.

[rjshae]

On 11/9/2020 at 7:17 AM, Gfted1 said:

Pfizer's New COVID-19 Vaccine Prevents 90% of Infections.

HUZZAH! Lets try it out on our oldsters ASAP!

The CEO of Pfizer sold $5.6 million worth of stock on the day of this news announcement. Things that make you go hmm...

Pfizer CEO Sold Millions In Stock After Coronavirus Vaccine News, Raising Questions

[Zoraptor]

The data that made the stocks soar has also not been peer reviewed. Which doesn't mean it isn't accurate, but does mean that we cannot be sure it is.

As vaccines go the Pfizer one isn't a great option anyway- it's mRNA based so hard to make and expensive, and requires dry ice level chilling. If there are alternatives available that are even close to being as effective they'll be picked first.

[Gorth]

12 minutes ago, Zoraptor said:

The data that made the stocks soar has also not been peer reviewed. Which doesn't mean it isn't accurate, but does mean that we cannot be sure it is.

As vaccines go the Pfizer one isn't a great option anyway- it's mRNA based so hard to make and expensive, and requires dry ice level chilling. If there are alternatives available that are even close to being as effective they'll be picked first.

Trust (Turkish-)German scientists to not pick the easy options...

 

Expensive treatments might still help reduce the spread while cheaper alternatives are developed for mass consumption. If people don't want the vaccine, add it to the tap water.

 

Edit: It does look like it's effective for how short a development time it had. Still, trials are one thing, real world application another (as a developer, I can relate to that):

‘When you put [a vaccine] out in the real world, people may behave differently,’ said Dr. Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/biontech-and-pfizers-covid-19-vaccine-is-surprisingly-effective-though-experts-question-what-effectiveness-will-look-like-in-the-real-world-2020-11-13

 

[BruceVC]

On 11/13/2020 at 1:25 AM, Gorth said:

 

“

 

And in more local news (from my pov), The state of Victoria has now had 0 new cases the last 14 days. Looks like the draconian lock down measures did the job.

Draconian, really ....what would you define as draconian when it comes to  globally proven and successful lockdown measures that we know work when numerous countries have seen cases of virus outburst . So in other words Oz did the right thing in Victoria and it achieved the expected result 

I am not trying to be rude at all but  when we unintentionally start seeing correct but necessary lockdown measures as "Draconian" you feed the false narrative that these steps are not necessary.....and if you look at the current reality of the virus spread in many countries like the USA, EU, Russia and India you will see what the virus spread causes

And I consider you a reasonable and informed person when it comes to the virus so if you think the Victoria lockdown as unnecessarily extreme I wonder how many other citizens in Oz think the same. Yet the absolute truth is your country has been able to currently curtail the virus spread so I cannot understand how anyone could criticize your virus policy?

I hope this makes sense because the sad reality for many countries, including SA, is we dont have the political will and resources to be able to implement this type of successful approach....so I look at Oz in an envious way because you are able to truly change the virus trajectory and you arent dependent on the vaccine like most of us to make this same change 

Be grateful Gorthfuscious, be grateful. I will swop your virus approach any day with the SA one 

[Gorth]

14 minutes ago, BruceVC said:

when it comes to the virus so if you think the Victoria lockdown as unnecessarily extreme

Actually, the sad thing is it was so unnecessary. Just look at the rest of Australia. The local government ****ed up and hired private companies for the hotel security job instead of using the police to enforce it. Those companies screwed up big time and should never have been used for something that should have been the police's job in first place. As for draconian... yeah, not used to seeing soldiers in the street enforcing curfews. Would've been better of those troops (and the police) had been doing the private contractors job in the first place?

 

[BruceVC]

47 minutes ago, Gorth said:

Actually, the sad thing is it was so unnecessary. Just look at the rest of Australia. The local government ****ed up and hired private companies for the hotel security job instead of using the police to enforce it. Those companies screwed up big time and should never have been used for something that should have been the police's job in first place. As for draconian... yeah, not used to seeing soldiers in the street enforcing curfews. Would've been better of those troops (and the police) had been doing the private contractors job in the first place?

 

Thanks for clarifying because now I understand what you mean by draconian and this raises an important point that is very relevant to how countries should and can deal with virus spread. And this current  post just highlights this  point

If I understand the overall Oz approach in Victoria, were the army and private security only deployed in Victoria to enforce the curfew and can you elaborate on the hotel security  policy you mentioned meaning did every hotel in every state have to use private security to enforce the policy or this only in Victoria ? So when you say " you not  use to seeing the army enforcing curfews " do you mean people living outside of Victoria would see on TV the curfew being enforced  and that was jarring and unnerving ?

So for example in your personal case, and I am not sure exactly where you live , did you follow the curfews on TV ?

[Gorth]

3 hours ago, BruceVC said:

Thanks for clarifying because now I understand what you mean by draconian and this raises an important point that is very relevant to how countries should and can deal with virus spread. And this current  post just highlights this  point

If I understand the overall Oz approach in Victoria, were the army and private security only deployed in Victoria to enforce the curfew and can you elaborate on the hotel security  policy you mentioned meaning did every hotel in every state have to use private security to enforce the policy or this only in Victoria ? So when you say " you not  use to seeing the army enforcing curfews " do you mean people living outside of Victoria would see on TV the curfew being enforced  and that was jarring and unnerving ?

So for example in your personal case, and I am not sure exactly where you live , did you follow the curfews on TV ?

The other states used the police force to guard the "inmates" in the hotels (14 days of mandatory quarantine at the guests expense when traveling from either overseas or interstate). Australian citizen only from overseas at the time (Kiwis are welcome now, no quarantine required). Victoria just got this "brilliant" idea they could outsource the police work and it was a failure of epic proportions. As the cases exploded in Melbourne and later the various regions in Victoria (state borders were closed), all the strict measures, including curfews were put in place. All of which could have been avoided and people could have been a lot better off 5 months earlier. I live in Brisbane, Queensland (large chunk of land in the northeast of Australia, part tropical part sub-tropical). Queensland shut its borders to both NSW and VIC (and NT had already closed it's borders to all states and territories to protect its numerous indigenous communities). I lived in Victoria (Melbourne) for a while, but moved north in March, just 2 weeks before the borders closed

[Keyrock]

I'm in no hurry to get Pfizer's vaccine, or any of the others, for that matter. I'm not an anti-vaxxer or anything, but drugs generally take 5-10 years to get approval. Under the circumstances, I understand the vaccines getting fast-tracked. That said, I'll let guinea pigs brave heroes beta test them for a good while before getting the vaccine myself.

[Azdeus]

42 minutes ago, Keyrock said:

I'm in no hurry to get Pfizer's vaccine, or any of the others, for that matter. I'm not an anti-vaxxer or anything, but drugs generally take 5-10 years to get approval. Under the circumstances, I understand the vaccines getting fast-tracked. That said, I'll let guinea pigs brave heroes beta test them for a good while before getting the vaccine myself.

This.

I hate the antivaxx movement, but I don't feel I want to take any chances and be part of the repeat of the swine flu vaccine issues that plagued us here. I've read that the vaccine side effects fund we have has been increased, but what ****ing good will a onetime payment do if I get hit with similar side effects (narcolepsy)? My life would be pretty much over, I love driving, cars and trucks, and your licence gets revoked (Rightly so, not complaining) if you have narcolepsy.

In 5 years or something I'd feel more comfortable to get one myself.

[Elerond]

Risk of new vaccines depend more how well its working method is know, when we are speaking 5-10 years approval times. 

Like for example two new flu vaccines are developed on markets each year, because how fast influenza viruses are changing and they are approved without long period testing because they are based on well known methods.

[213374U]

Odds are you won't be allowed to choose because you are far from alone in thinking that way, and pop immunization would need to reach 60-70% to start making this thing go away.

Here, mistrust in these fast-tracked vaccines hovers around 43%, whereas trust in vaccines in general is fairly high.

[Keyrock]

Unless it's at gunpoint, good luck forcing me to get the vaccine right away.

[Zoraptor]

They will give it to old (and other vulnerable) people first, especially if it's expensive and in low supply. 40USD is expensive for a vaccine, but it's a massive saving vs a day in ICU. There is also the vaccine side effect vs virus 'side effects' to consider. If it's, say, a 1% chance of vaccine side effects vs 10% chance of organ damage from the virus you'd be better off risking the vaccine. Indeed, the ultimate stupidity of anti vaxxers is not that there are no potential side effects from MMR and other vaccines, it's that those side effects are way less dangerous and way less prevalent than getting mumps, measles or rubella are.

Actually making a vaccine can be really cheap. I buy sheep vaccines, and they're ~10c US per 1ml dose. And they're 5 in 1 vaccines, so could be seen as ~2c per dose. Then again no one throws a wobbly if the odd sheep has an adverse reaction or if the odd sheep still dies from pulpy kidney despite being vaccinated.

Edited November 15, 2020 by Zoraptor

[Zoraptor]

Since the Pfizer stats came out two others have as well- also non peer reviewed, so grain of salt the same as Pfizer's: Sputnik (92%) and Moderna (94.5%). Either should be a lot cheaper and easier than the Pfizer vaccine too.

[Zoraptor]

We can add Astra-Zenica/ Oxford to the list. 70%-90%* effectiveness, but it will be far cheaper and easier to handle than the mRNA based ones. Which is why Pfizer is desperate to get that emergency approval, they self funded and need to make the money back before cheaper options become available.

*depending on dosing, 70% effectiveness is just high enough to get to 'herd immunity' anyway though higher is always better.

[Azdeus]

I read an op-ed today from a member of Médecins Sans Frontières that pointed out that EU is opposing a proposal from India and South Africa to the WTO to allow countries to avoid the patent rights for Covid vaccines temporarily, so that poor countries can buy or produce cheaper knock-offs, and I'm entirely in agreement with him. We can't let the monetary interests of massive mega-corporations dictate the accessability of a vaccine to prevent a global goddamn pandemic, now or ever.

[BruceVC]

3 hours ago, Azdeus said:

I read an op-ed today from a member of Médecins Sans Frontières that pointed out that EU is opposing a proposal from India and South Africa to the WTO to allow countries to avoid the patent rights for Covid vaccines temporarily, so that poor countries can buy or produce cheaper knock-offs, and I'm entirely in agreement with him. We can't let the monetary interests of massive mega-corporations dictate the accessability of a vaccine to prevent a global goddamn pandemic, now or ever.

Interesting post, I am not sure its fair or reasonable to allow the patent of any Corona vaccine globally to be made available? In the case of SA we dont have the resources and intuitions to create  any vaccine so I am not sure what we expect 

I understand this is positioned as a case of " in  interest of humanity " but there  are over 200 vaccines trials ongoing and there will be many choices around different costing models available 

Also the global pharmaceutical companies have on several  occasions explained that the initial vaccines will be made available on " zero percent profit ". Countries can and will negotiate competitive prices for the vaccines for there citizens 

Here is a good link that highlights how governments should and can negotiate vaccine prices 

https://www.npr.org/sections/coronavirus-live-updates/2020/07/22/894184607/u-s-to-get-100-million-doses-of-pfizer-coronavirus-vaccine-in-1-95-billion-deal

 

 

Edited November 24, 2020 by BruceVC