Had the first Pfizer the other day, thankfully only had a dead arm for the following day or two. Though I hear side effects are a lot more common and more severe after the second.
The vaccines | vaxxed boosted unvaxxed? New poll
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Has there been anymore rare blood clot cases or deaths in Norway and Germany related to the AZ vaccine or elsewhere? Would've expected a few more to appear.
Canada is pausing AstraZeneca for adults below age 55
https://abcnews.go.com/Internationa...anel-recommends-astrazeneca-pause-55-76751765
https://abcnews.go.com/Internationa...anel-recommends-astrazeneca-pause-55-76751765
I think it's good in some respects that vaccine confidence is still very high.
That’s true, good point.
I thought European investigations resulted in no evidence of the AZ vaccin having these side effects?
Safe vaccine with excellent effectiveness. Even though less effective against some of the variants, the initial data is that it will still be highly protective especially in terms of reducing severe disease. Like Pfizer it also has the advantage of being an mRNA vaccine which means they can tweak it for the new variants quite quickly. It is likely that a third booster shot of Phizer and Moderna will be available in late 21 or early 22 that will target the new variants.
A function of probability.
You can of course win the lottery on your first single ticket purchase but the odds of you winning are much much better if you buy millions of tickets. Not suppressing the virus and allowing millions to be infected hugely increased the chance of there being a "winning" ticket, with the winning ticket likely to be a single patient zero for each variant, who was chronically infected for long enough to allow the evolution of the new variant. The original strain wasn't totally killed by their immune system but was damaged/suppressed so there was huge evolutionary pressure favoring any variant that was both viable and less effected by the patients immune systems and/or the medical treatments they received.
A lesson for our future dealings with a pandemic imo.
How can this calculation be right? 1 in 100,000 would mean every country would’ve noticed it by now..
What’s the red cafe stance on this now?
@Wibble @Pogue Mahone
1 in 100k seems substantially riskier. But feels like a position thatll be retracted..
I read in a Norwegian newspaper some days ago that German scientists know a key factor behind the blood clots from the AZ vaccine, but they will not share it until their findings are printed in the Lancet.
That's based on a cluster of cases in Norway. - which suggests the rate could be that high in women under 55. The UK and the rest of Europe are now going back through their records and checking how many other cases there have been, and in what group. The EMA are due to report on that next week.
That could mean finding milder cases or cases with slightly different symptoms that were treated successfully. Other causes (like the onset of covid) can trigger similar events so they'll look for things that were put down to disease that could have been the vaccine as well. Right now, everyone's digging for answers but the product is on hold in some countries, and on restrictive use in others.
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This is a preprint from one of the German research teams. I don't know if it's the report that the Norwegian press were referring to.
https://www.researchsquare.com/article/rs-362354/v1
That looks to be an expansion of the analysis and treatment advice that came out from the German team a couple of weeks ago. I'm not sure it has any new information though, just more details of their results and reasoning.
The same researcher, yes! Greinacher.
Here is the norwegian article + the link to the german researchers company statement/news article :
https://www.vg.no/nyheter/innenriks...aa-hemmelighold-rundt-tysk-vaksinefunn-uetisk
https://idw-online.de/en/news765335
It'd be good to get some clarity. I have the option of taking the jab(in my 30s) and wondering if I should wait a week more.
Incidentally, for the medically inclined, this treatment/diagnosis guideline is a model of clarity, based on current knowledge - though of course I don't know how accurate it is.
https://covid19-sciencetable.ca/sci...t-following-astrazeneca-covid-19-vaccination/
https://covid19-sciencetable.ca/sci...t-following-astrazeneca-covid-19-vaccination/
Would you not get variants if you spread out the vaccines over multiple countries though?
To be honest, I regret that post. I keep getting sucked into having a pointless moan about UK exports. And this isn’t even the right thread for it.
Re vaccines and variants I was assuming that more evenly shared vaccines would prevent the really wild, out of control, outbreaks that seem to cause these variants. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the three most troublesome variants have arisen in three countries that experienced the most out of control outbreaks on their respective continents.
The sooner every country has a decent proportion vaccinated the sooner we put an end to these huge surges. Feck knows though. As I said in a subsequent post I’ve also read that it’s possible a prolonged infection in a single patient could have been the incubator for these variants.
My friend in New York signed up for the vaccine yesterday, they're down to the over 30s now. She will get Dose 1 tomorrow.
I'm equal parts amazed and frustrated by it. Amazed at what they can do when they get their act together, frustrated that they exert control over the whole world but when the world needs them they stick two fingers up.
I'm equal parts amazed and frustrated by it. Amazed at what they can do when they get their act together, frustrated that they exert control over the whole world but when the world needs them they stick two fingers up.
Thanks for your reply.
Another techy but not that techy article on platelets and blood clots etc. This time also covering the similar but different observations from a US review of mRNA possible vaccine adverse reactions.
https://www.medpagetoday.com/special-reports/exclusives/91813
https://www.medpagetoday.com/special-reports/exclusives/91813
Quite liked this write-up: https://www.gov.uk/government/publi...irus-vaccine-summary-of-yellow-card-reporting
1st vaccine done just now. 14 minutes to go until I can go home. 
There have been a couple of more cases reported. Today various regions have started to stop using AZ for women under 55 while others have stopped using it for anyone under 60. So basically like France and Canada. Does make sense in my opinion, there are enough people above 60 left to be vaccinated, however another change of policy definitely doesn`t help the growing scepticism.
I saw that. My only question with that approach is whether we’re mainly seeing these cases in the young because the AZ vaccine has been mainly given to the young? I get the impression that the elderly have been excluded from roll out in most EU countries, so that’s a more likely explanation for them being spared these clots than some sort of physiological difference.
Yeah could be, although the over 65 ban has been removed for quite a while now. I think the thought process behind it, is that the clotting and the specific thrombosis is linked to a specific immune reaction, which older people potentially won`t have because they have a weaker immune system to react(?). But I`m not an expert, so kind of just guessing.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/pfizer-covid-vaccine-price-hike-post-pandemic/
Pfizer execs discuss hiking vaccine price after pandemic wanes
BY AUDREY MCNAMARA
MARCH 17, 2021 / 7:09 AM / CBS NEWS
A top executive for Pfizer suggested to investors last week that pricing for its COVID-19 vaccine could increase post-pandemic. The suggestion raises questions about whether a drug, developed at the behest of the federal government to respond to a global crisis, could turn a profit for one company.
The possibility was raised by Carter Lewis Gould, a senior analyst for Biopharma Equity Research at Barclays, during a virtual global healthcare conference hosted by the bank. Gould, referencing comments made by Pfizer executives over the summer, asked how the pharmaceutical company still envisioned pursuing "higher pricing" as "we move from a pandemic to an endemic phase," according to an edited transcript of the conversation.
"Clearly got a lot of focus on the street. And in particular, some of your comments around the potential for higher pricing," Gould said of Pfizer's summer suggestion. "I think one of the things that people point to is both the optics of that as well as some of their experience with the flu market. Now this is absolutely different. But I was hoping you could maybe give us a little bit more depth on your thoughts here and around the potential to pursue higher pricing down the road?"
In response, Frank A. D'Amelio, CFO & executive VP of global supply for Pfizer, said the company anticipates a "significant opportunity" for its vaccine "from a pricing perspective" as we move "from a pandemic situation to an endemic situation."
"So if you look at how current demand and current pricing is being driven, it's clearly not being driven by what I'll call normal market conditions, normal market forces. It's really been driven by kind of the pandemic state that we've been in and the needs of governments to really secure doses from the various vaccine suppliers," D'Amelio explained. "So what we believe, what I believe is as we move from a pandemic state, from a pandemic situation to an endemic situation, normal market forces, normal market conditions will start to kick in.
And factors like efficacy, booster ability, clinical utility will basically become very important, and we view that as, quite frankly, a significant opportunity for our vaccine from a demand perspective, from a pricing perspective, given the clinical profile of our vaccine," he said. "So clearly, more to come here. But we think as this shifts from pandemic to endemic, we think there's an opportunity here for us."
In July, Pfizer signed a $1.95 billion pact to provide the U.S. government with 100 million doses of its COVID-19 vaccine. That order was doubled in December when the company inked another $2 billion deal with former President Trump's administration.
"Eligible U.S. residents will continue to receive the vaccine for free, consistent with the U.S. government's commitment to providing free access for COVID-19 vaccines and according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) recommendations for the vaccine's phased rollout," reads a press release from Pfizer after the second deal.
The public-private relationship allowed Americans to receive the vaccine for free, but, according to Pfizer, does not mean the federal government helped fund its creation. Kathrin Jansen, a senior vice president and the head of vaccine research and development at Pfizer, noted in November that the company did not take any federal money to help pay for research and development.
According to The New York Times, Jansen said Pfizer was "never part of the Warp Speed" and have "never taken any money from the U.S. government, or from anyone."
A spokeswoman for Pfizer later clarified that Pfizer was part of Operation Warp Speed, but the federal government's investment did not go toward vaccine research or development.
"While Pfizer did reach an advanced purchase agreement with the U.S. government, the company did not accept BARDA funding for the research and development process," reads the Pfizer statement. "All the investment for R&D was made by Pfizer at risk. Dr. Jansen was emphasizing that last point."
This condition of Pfizer's agreement — which is not shared by the two other pharmaceutical companies that have developed COVID vaccines approved for distribution — could make things complicated once the pandemic has subsided, according to Jordan Paradise, a professor at the Loyola University Chicago School of Law who wrote about the "eventual costs" of "approved products" associated with COVID-19 in September.
Paradise's article looked at the federal government's power to regulate the pricing of products created with the help of federal funding. That power comes from the Bayh-Dole Act, a set of regulations passed in 1980 to address inventions arising from federal government-funded research.
Key to the legislation is something called "march-in rights," which allow the federal government to "step in and assert legal title to an invention," under "certain circumstances," Paradise writes. Those circumstances fall into two categories: "When there has been no efforts to commercialize within an agreed upon time-frame," or when "'action is necessary to alleviate health or safety needs.'"
Paradise, however, points out that "although these march-in rights sound like an appealing way to keep institutional patent holders in check, the US government has never actually utilized this authority." In fact, she notes, the National Institutes of Health "has denied all six petitions to exercise march-in rights."
The power has never been invoked, Paradise said, because it is ill-defined: "It's unclear. It's so unclear that the government hasn't exercised their march in rights ever."
Asked whether the Act could be used to prevent pharmaceutical companies — whether or not they took money from the federal government, and to what extent — from raising prices on COVID-19 vaccines, Paradise said altogether new legislation could be necessary. She pointed to insulin price cap laws, on the books in several states, as potential templates, but noted that, "at the federal level it's a free market."
Another unknown is when the pandemic officially ends, or, becomes an endemic, as Pfizer executives alluded to last week. Paradise said that call is up to head of Health and Human Services, currently led by acting secretary Norris Cochran. President Joe Biden has nominated Xavier Becerra to lead the department, although his confirmation had been deadlocked until last week.
"I think it's going to be a change," she said. "At what point does the pandemic end and the government stop paying for vaccines?"
First published on March 16, 2021 / 7:18 PM
Pfizer execs discuss hiking vaccine price after pandemic wanes
BY AUDREY MCNAMARA
MARCH 17, 2021 / 7:09 AM / CBS NEWS
A top executive for Pfizer suggested to investors last week that pricing for its COVID-19 vaccine could increase post-pandemic. The suggestion raises questions about whether a drug, developed at the behest of the federal government to respond to a global crisis, could turn a profit for one company.
The possibility was raised by Carter Lewis Gould, a senior analyst for Biopharma Equity Research at Barclays, during a virtual global healthcare conference hosted by the bank. Gould, referencing comments made by Pfizer executives over the summer, asked how the pharmaceutical company still envisioned pursuing "higher pricing" as "we move from a pandemic to an endemic phase," according to an edited transcript of the conversation.
"Clearly got a lot of focus on the street. And in particular, some of your comments around the potential for higher pricing," Gould said of Pfizer's summer suggestion. "I think one of the things that people point to is both the optics of that as well as some of their experience with the flu market. Now this is absolutely different. But I was hoping you could maybe give us a little bit more depth on your thoughts here and around the potential to pursue higher pricing down the road?"
In response, Frank A. D'Amelio, CFO & executive VP of global supply for Pfizer, said the company anticipates a "significant opportunity" for its vaccine "from a pricing perspective" as we move "from a pandemic situation to an endemic situation."
"So if you look at how current demand and current pricing is being driven, it's clearly not being driven by what I'll call normal market conditions, normal market forces. It's really been driven by kind of the pandemic state that we've been in and the needs of governments to really secure doses from the various vaccine suppliers," D'Amelio explained. "So what we believe, what I believe is as we move from a pandemic state, from a pandemic situation to an endemic situation, normal market forces, normal market conditions will start to kick in.
And factors like efficacy, booster ability, clinical utility will basically become very important, and we view that as, quite frankly, a significant opportunity for our vaccine from a demand perspective, from a pricing perspective, given the clinical profile of our vaccine," he said. "So clearly, more to come here. But we think as this shifts from pandemic to endemic, we think there's an opportunity here for us."
In July, Pfizer signed a $1.95 billion pact to provide the U.S. government with 100 million doses of its COVID-19 vaccine. That order was doubled in December when the company inked another $2 billion deal with former President Trump's administration.
"Eligible U.S. residents will continue to receive the vaccine for free, consistent with the U.S. government's commitment to providing free access for COVID-19 vaccines and according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) recommendations for the vaccine's phased rollout," reads a press release from Pfizer after the second deal.
The public-private relationship allowed Americans to receive the vaccine for free, but, according to Pfizer, does not mean the federal government helped fund its creation. Kathrin Jansen, a senior vice president and the head of vaccine research and development at Pfizer, noted in November that the company did not take any federal money to help pay for research and development.
According to The New York Times, Jansen said Pfizer was "never part of the Warp Speed" and have "never taken any money from the U.S. government, or from anyone."
A spokeswoman for Pfizer later clarified that Pfizer was part of Operation Warp Speed, but the federal government's investment did not go toward vaccine research or development.
"While Pfizer did reach an advanced purchase agreement with the U.S. government, the company did not accept BARDA funding for the research and development process," reads the Pfizer statement. "All the investment for R&D was made by Pfizer at risk. Dr. Jansen was emphasizing that last point."
This condition of Pfizer's agreement — which is not shared by the two other pharmaceutical companies that have developed COVID vaccines approved for distribution — could make things complicated once the pandemic has subsided, according to Jordan Paradise, a professor at the Loyola University Chicago School of Law who wrote about the "eventual costs" of "approved products" associated with COVID-19 in September.
Paradise's article looked at the federal government's power to regulate the pricing of products created with the help of federal funding. That power comes from the Bayh-Dole Act, a set of regulations passed in 1980 to address inventions arising from federal government-funded research.
Key to the legislation is something called "march-in rights," which allow the federal government to "step in and assert legal title to an invention," under "certain circumstances," Paradise writes. Those circumstances fall into two categories: "When there has been no efforts to commercialize within an agreed upon time-frame," or when "'action is necessary to alleviate health or safety needs.'"
Paradise, however, points out that "although these march-in rights sound like an appealing way to keep institutional patent holders in check, the US government has never actually utilized this authority." In fact, she notes, the National Institutes of Health "has denied all six petitions to exercise march-in rights."
The power has never been invoked, Paradise said, because it is ill-defined: "It's unclear. It's so unclear that the government hasn't exercised their march in rights ever."
Asked whether the Act could be used to prevent pharmaceutical companies — whether or not they took money from the federal government, and to what extent — from raising prices on COVID-19 vaccines, Paradise said altogether new legislation could be necessary. She pointed to insulin price cap laws, on the books in several states, as potential templates, but noted that, "at the federal level it's a free market."
Another unknown is when the pandemic officially ends, or, becomes an endemic, as Pfizer executives alluded to last week. Paradise said that call is up to head of Health and Human Services, currently led by acting secretary Norris Cochran. President Joe Biden has nominated Xavier Becerra to lead the department, although his confirmation had been deadlocked until last week.
"I think it's going to be a change," she said. "At what point does the pandemic end and the government stop paying for vaccines?"
First published on March 16, 2021 / 7:18 PM
isn't the age profile of those being vaccinated the main difference between the UK and EU, which would explain why the cases are far more prevalent in Germany/Norway/etc than in UK, which is also using AZ a lot?
Seems to be, yes. Although I read somewhere that Norway’s post marketing surveillance is a lot more sophisticated than the UK yellow card system.
Plus you’d imagine that even if AZ goes to young people only in Norway, there’s been so much more used in the UK that the numbers of young exposed might be similar? (Don’t know the figures, am guessing)
How’s your mum doing? Hopefully the bruising turned out to be nothing sinister?
Interesting stuff on Pfizer vaccine price hike.
Am I right in thinking AZ isn't being sold for profit? Heard it mentioned but not sure
Am I right in thinking AZ isn't being sold for profit? Heard it mentioned but not sure
I've just been to see the village doctor. There were a group of old men in the waiting room (all over 75), and they were talking about booking their vaccinations - the 70 to 79-year-olds could book from last night in our region. They had appointments for the end of next month, one was even in May.
It's also a long journey to one of the 4 provincial vaccination centres, you can't get it locally if you live in a small place like we do. This is where Italy's slipping up. More vaccination points are needed, and old folk shouldn't have to drive for 40 minutes to get a vaccination.
It's also a long journey to one of the 4 provincial vaccination centres, you can't get it locally if you live in a small place like we do. This is where Italy's slipping up. More vaccination points are needed, and old folk shouldn't have to drive for 40 minutes to get a vaccination.
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From mid-April pharmacies can do it. They've already started in some places.
I hope the local politicians think the pharmacy is pretty enough, Id suggest home visits like they do here to vaccinate but I’d be afraid they demand they arrive in Ferraris
Bruise has subsided, so hopefully nothing.
A twitter reply said most of the deaths are after 1st dose, so that's reassuring also (I guess if it had to happen, it would have happened by now).
Oh you should have seen the bickering in the local press this past week. How dare the regional politician insult our town
Also turns out the owner of the villa he's sending us all to is his daughter's boss or something like that.
Hmm, we have one pharmacist and one lady who works part-time as her assistant. When the pharmacist's on holiday, the place closes down completely.
We are literally the fecking worst at COVID.