Amazing there were enough neurons to speak and breath at the same time.
The vaccines | vaxxed boosted unvaxxed? New poll
- Thread starter Badunk
- Start date
Amazing there were enough neurons to speak and breath at the same time.
Fauci not surprisingly is now saying that he didn't mean to attack the competence/professionalism of the MHRA by suggesting they were rushing the approval, just that the process is different...
"Our process is one that takes more time than it takes in the UK. And that's just the reality," Dr Fauci told the BBC. "I did not mean to imply any sloppiness even though it came out that way."
"Our process is one that takes more time than it takes in the UK. And that's just the reality," Dr Fauci told the BBC. "I did not mean to imply any sloppiness even though it came out that way."
Wow, thats ridiculous. They're going to replace the PS5 scalpers as the source of public hate
I bet a few PL footballers get THIS.
The Daily Mail have probably already written the article and just need to fill in the blanks with names.
That might get you in deep shit here as the government is giving it to everyone for free.
I suspect it won’t be too long for vaccine supply to get hijcked en route or stolen from storage locations and a thriving vaccine black market to emerge.
Ditto people with access will steal a few to give to their nearest and dearest before their turn is due.
BBC News - Dr Fauci apologises for saying UK 'rushed' vaccine
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-55177948
Total backtracking now it seems.
It's a totally understandable situation. Someone from the UK government said they're a better country with better scientists following a better process, and that pissed him off so he just pointed out it was conclusively untrue. The vaccine they've just approved was created in the US, has been heavily supported by the US regulatory and scientific community, and the process the UK follow is demonstrably less thorough. They haven't done anything better here, they've just done less, which makes it quicker. He was insulted in a high pressure situation and he responded in kind.
But ultimately no-one from the UK medical community said that so it isn't appropriate for the US medical community to say it either. He should've just dismissed Williamson as someone who doesn't know what he's talking about and is creating new openings for vaccine hesitancy by politicising one of the most important developments of our time. Instead Fauci politicised it more and clearly people in the community reminded him how that makes things worse for everyone.
It is notable that Fauci says checking this raw data is basically just a meaningless formality though. They already know it's safe and effective, they know the FDA will make the statement that it's safe and effective next week, they know the UK are using something that they are going to approve. They are just applying a more rigorous process because that's what the public need to see to want to take it. So it does on some level suggest the UK's "expedited" process is the most practical in this situation.
Same in the UK.
Good post. Gavin Williamson is a prat, who clearly doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Fauci shouldn’t have responded the way he did and it’s good of him to retract his comments. Williamson should do the same but we won’t hold our breath on that one.
Regrettable comments from Fauci but I imagine said slightly in the heat of the moment and perhaps having just heard Williamson's stupid comment.
These comments by some of our MPs about Brexit or Williamson's even more stupid ones are incredibly frustrating because it unnecessarily aggravates allies and throws doubts in the minds of some people, who may already be Covid vaccine skeptic, that we're cutting corners in some way. Not to mention how incredibly incorrect the Brexit comments are (we would have had the ability to do exactly the same whilst in the EU anyway) and how inappropriate it is to talk about how 'our scientists are the best' when all we've done is authorised a vaccine developed by a Turkish origin couple, raised in Germany, in a German biotech firm and with American support.
I think there is a huuuge difference between someone who is totally anti-vax, won't give their kids MMR etc to many of the people who are slightly skeptical about the covid vaccine. Its unhelpful to lump the two in together imo and I reckon the vast majority in this are in the latter.
Authorising before everyone else, making disparaging comments about the 30 countries who are roughly our closest allies and semi-forcing them to reply in a semi-snarky way does not help with convincing them.
I mean, should be a bare minimum but glad that Johnson has, at least so far, managed to restrain himself from making similarly stupid comments.
These comments by some of our MPs about Brexit or Williamson's even more stupid ones are incredibly frustrating because it unnecessarily aggravates allies and throws doubts in the minds of some people, who may already be Covid vaccine skeptic, that we're cutting corners in some way. Not to mention how incredibly incorrect the Brexit comments are (we would have had the ability to do exactly the same whilst in the EU anyway) and how inappropriate it is to talk about how 'our scientists are the best' when all we've done is authorised a vaccine developed by a Turkish origin couple, raised in Germany, in a German biotech firm and with American support.
I think there is a huuuge difference between someone who is totally anti-vax, won't give their kids MMR etc to many of the people who are slightly skeptical about the covid vaccine. Its unhelpful to lump the two in together imo and I reckon the vast majority in this are in the latter.
Authorising before everyone else, making disparaging comments about the 30 countries who are roughly our closest allies and semi-forcing them to reply in a semi-snarky way does not help with convincing them.
I mean, should be a bare minimum but glad that Johnson has, at least so far, managed to restrain himself from making similarly stupid comments.
Excellent, thank you! Will have a browse through later. Some exciting evening reading....
I think an even bigger problem will be scams offering vaccines and possibly even worse fake vaccines.
Last edited:
I'd hope if this is true the GMC comes down hard.
Usually I despise them with a passion but I would think this is incredibly inappropriate. Though actually even putting aside the moral questions of this, my main question would be where on earth they'd get the vaccine from? I can't imagine any company will be selling to private companies/ individuals anytime soon, at least openly. Which means they could only get it from skimming off the top of what they'd received from the government to give out to the very vulnerable/ HCWs etc.
That latter category includes a lot of doctors. I’ve been replying to a load of whatsapps from doctor pals who are understandably a little anxious about being first in line for a vaccine developed/approved at such a lightning pace and want a better understanding of how that was possible.
The tl;dr answer they get is because a lot of the hard work was done already and never before has pharmaceutical development been done in an environment where money was no object, trial sites/subjects are absolutely desperate to be involved and regulators falling over themselves to expedite the approval process.
Tbh it sounds a little implausible. I read it on doctors.net, which has its fair share of flakes and loons (as you know!)
That is a bit of a worry.
It’s funny to see that even doctors appear a little anxious over being first and the of speed the vaccine has appeared but if a run of the mill caf poster talks about any hesitation they become a anti vaxxer and told they’re selfish and to believe the scientists by assume the caf COVID scientists
In fairness, in a way I don't blame them. They've been badly let down by their governments in a lot of countries and are continually wary of the decisions being made by those same people. Its human nature to be wary of something that appears totally different from the normal.
Still, like you said, the circumstances are different in this case and I would hope we get full access to the data soon so people can have a proper read through of the data.
Very true! A lot of hospital docs can be a little disparaging towards GPs too (some of my colleagues are still under the impression GPs are sitting in their offices doing nothing at the moment, which just baffles me) so not surprised they can have thoughts like this.
I read in the Guardian that NHS staff aren't now going to be the first to get the vaccine. Instead, it'll be care home staff (who'll presumably have to go to a hospital to get it), and inpatients/outpatients who are over 80. I can't quite see the logic of this. Surely people who are exposed to the virus as part of their work need first protection?
In Italy, it's going to be doctors and healthcare workers first, then care home residents, then the over 80s, then people over 60 and younger folk with a chronic heath condition, then key workers like police, teachers and firefighters. After that, it'll be made available to younger healthy people who aren't in any of the above categories.
In Italy, it's going to be doctors and healthcare workers first, then care home residents, then the over 80s, then people over 60 and younger folk with a chronic heath condition, then key workers like police, teachers and firefighters. After that, it'll be made available to younger healthy people who aren't in any of the above categories.
It’s been a really interesting journey for me, personally. When I worked as a doc in the HSE/NHS I formed an incredibly low opinion of almost every state run service I interacted with. But when I moved to pharma I was blown away by the diligence, attention to detail and work ethic of the regulators. You don’t have any exposure to them as a clinician but they’re shit hot, they really are.
Isn’t it care home residents (as well as staff) at the top of the queue in the UK? The logic is, presumably, that you’ll save more lives, more quickly, by first vaccinating those who are most likely to die if they catch the virus. The care homes seem to have had the worst of it in every country that’s badly affected.
You can see why the medics would be pissed off about this though. I know I would.
The care home residents are excluded for now, because of the logistics of splitting the batches of 975 individual phials. They'll be vaccinated by NHS staff when the MRHA says it's safe.
In a way there's some logic to it, because care home residents don't leave the building - the staff are the people who bring the virus in from outside. Some work in more than one care home, too.
edit - I agree with you that if I was a doctor or nurse working in a hospital, I'd feel very unhappy about it.
I'm surprised he was able to string a sentence together coherently in the first place. WTF. This is why I lose faith in democracy every day.
Considering how many people have died form other ailments, who could have had their lives pro longed or even saved, I don't know whether to be inspired or cry..
Except when it comes to the scientific validity and efficacy of some medicinal drugs (not vaccines), especially drugs used in psychiatry, where the vested financial interest of big pharma come into play. This is a topic best suited to another thread, but for see example:
Pharmaceuticals as a market for “lemons”: Theory and practice
Drug trials ‘skewed by the pharmaceutical industry,’ GPs say
Deadly Medicines and Organised Crime: How Big Pharma Has Corrupted Healthcare
What doctors don’t know about the drugs they prescribe
This.
The number of scam sites offering Viagra and other supposedly life saving drugs increased unbelievably
Last edited by a moderator:
I don't blame them either. I'll admit, I do wish that we'd had the mRNA technology vaccines around for years - saving lives and proving the methods safe. The fact that it took a pandemic to bring one to market means it's become one of those leap of faith moments.
I understand enough about the Pfizer vaccine to know how it should work. I don't understand enough to know what the failure mechanisms could be. I can offer examples of things I would worry about, but that's not really the point, because I don't know what to worry about.
In the end we rely on the expertise of the regulators and their specialist advisors to challenge the research and ask all the questions, from the dumb ones to the ones that require detail and dissection of evidence. If they come from the same strata (but not actually the same people/organisations) that people feel have let them down before, then faith can't be taken for granted.
Yeah it seems a strange one to me. We can all agree there's geographic differences in these countries which influence distribution methods, storage facilities vary, the proportion of people in different high-risk settings vary, etc. But it's difficult to know how they could differ enough on that one level. The CDC published the evidence they used to vote on the decision of who to prioritise here, and they evaluated it on three key dimensions: science, implementation and ethics.
There was a discussion about who to prioritise out of the essential workers, adults with high risk conditions, and adults over 65 and the arguments for that aren't so clear-cut, but they had already taken it for granted that health care professionals were first up because it's easier, more effective and more just. One thing that does change the equation is whether the vaccine blocks infection or just disease. Theoretically if this vaccine doesn't block infection then it significantly weakens the argument for healthcare professionals as one key benefit of that is limiting in-hospital transmission.
Even still, it seems an obvious choice. Even just for morale. They've dealt with the worst of it this year and somehow they're supposed to be ok with being overlooked once more? Seems very dangerous. Then again, maybe they did get feedback from the medical profession that a lot of them didn't want to be first up, and more of the care home folks did? We do have folks in here that said their partners in healthcare had already said they were going to reject the 1st round of vaccinations. If a significant proportion of HCPs did so at the beginning it could have adverse effects in the long run. Similarly dramatically reducing the most severe effects in care homes could be the clearest evidence to the wider population that this brings huge benefits. The care home community did get the worst treatment at the beginning, after all. The UK were particularly bad on that one. Compensating for that isn't such a bad thing.
If the vaccine stops you from becoming ill but you can still transmit the virus surely it would be better to give it to the elderly and most at risk as they are least likely to be out and about spreading and are more likely to become ill from the virus.
Yeah, that’s why vaccinating care home staff but not residents is an odd one for me. I wonder if it’s logistical issues? Apart from the cold temperatures required, apparently it’s shipped in boxes with hundreds of doses that shouldn’t be opened until they’re at their final destination. So getting those doses into care home residents could cause lots of wastage.
Most elderly people in care homes don`t ever go out . Most elderly people with carers at home never go out. Even the elderly that do go out do so far less and would more than likely be more considerate once vaccinated. At risk carers and NHS could be high on the list for vaccination also.
Vaccinating care home staff and not residents is quite worrying as some of the younger vaccinated carers may also drop their guard a little as they are now safe, shouldn`t happen but human nature and a lot of carers are only carers cos there is no other work about.
They don't know yet if it stops transmission or not, it's not very likely according to the researchers but they just don't know yet, it'll be some time before they know that.
However, you're right in that it makes sense to still vaccinate residents ahead of carers as they are the most at risk.
I wrote a post last week stating I’ve already seen ‘Vaccine Vacations to USA’ being advertised in several countries!
Last edited:
Exactly! They’ll need a pneumatic drill to penetrate the skin..
The CDC's statement that "approximately 50% of transmission [came] from asymptomatic persons" yesterday is a little shocking to me. Will lead to a lot of tough questions midway through next year, when a good chunk of society will presumably be protected from symptoms but not protected from transmitting the virus. Can imagine society will be very divided on how "normal" life should be at that point.
Covid vaccine to have only 'marginal impact' on winter hospital admissions
https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/coro...act-on-winter-hospital-admissions/ar-BB1bDNrK
https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/coro...act-on-winter-hospital-admissions/ar-BB1bDNrK
Here’s the piece of research they use as a reference for that asymptomatic transmission line. Turns out the 50% headline % is a combination of presymptomatic and asymptomatic transmission. Which actually cause 47% and 7% respectively. Anyone in the trials who passed the virus on while presymptomatic would have eventually got symptoms and shown up in the efficacy data. If more than 9 out of 10 people who get infected without symptoms don’t pass the virus on then that’s actually kind of reassuring.