The vaccines | vaxxed boosted unvaxxed? New poll
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Saw that the other day, disgusting but no surprise. And NZ, a covid free country has also requested it. fecking humans.
My Mrs is a nurse and hasn't been offered it yet.
Good article that. Brings together a few different themes about the approach of the UK team. In particular that business about trying to be "good customers," who could help setup manufacturing links or run clinical trials, is striking.
Back to that distinction I've mentioned before that it seems the UK took it on as a series of development projects with uncertain outcomes, rather than as a conventional product procurement contract.
Annoying but unsurprising. With the US blocking exports, and the EU highly resistant, Canada is one of the countries who's been squeezed out. They're now starting to look at how they can guarantee supply for later in the year, by doing some manufacturing themselves.
Everyone is dependant on the same few sites who are already producing and anxiously waiting for the rest to ramp up.
Yes some areas of Lancashire seem to be doing really well rolling out the vaccine programme. Although my ex who is in group 4 with serious asthma only got his jab yesterday. I’m not expecting to be called until next month at least
If these vaccine passports become a thing do they apply for people who haven't yet been offered the vaccine?
I'm not against it in itself but with my age and no health problems I'm going to be one of the last groups offered it so am I going to be penalised through no fault of my own?
I'm not against it in itself but with my age and no health problems I'm going to be one of the last groups offered it so am I going to be penalised through no fault of my own?
Oooooh Matron
Interesting article on vaccine hesitancy in Bradford. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/health-55952189?__twitter_impression=true
Nothing that we haven't heard before, but some interesting specifics on vaccine uptake in different ethnic groups etc. It's a worrying picture, because on the face of it, some of the most Covid vulnerable people are actively turning the vaccine down, while many more are delaying.
I admit this section of the report did make me laugh/cringe before feeling guilty though:
One of the least-expected pockets of vaccine hesitancy Ratcliffe has discovered is within a group of about 50 street drinkers.
"They are largely living on the streets so they are very vulnerable," he says. "We run a clinic for them but again we have issues - they're refusing the vaccine and have bought into the crazy myths. Even though some of them inject all sorts of things, they won't have the vaccine."
Nothing that we haven't heard before, but some interesting specifics on vaccine uptake in different ethnic groups etc. It's a worrying picture, because on the face of it, some of the most Covid vulnerable people are actively turning the vaccine down, while many more are delaying.
I admit this section of the report did make me laugh/cringe before feeling guilty though:
One of the least-expected pockets of vaccine hesitancy Ratcliffe has discovered is within a group of about 50 street drinkers.
"They are largely living on the streets so they are very vulnerable," he says. "We run a clinic for them but again we have issues - they're refusing the vaccine and have bought into the crazy myths. Even though some of them inject all sorts of things, they won't have the vaccine."
Yes that's the most important thing and this is why I have a problem with some parts media "reporting" (and some people on here who jump to defend it and they know who they are). It's running with the narrative of "OMG this variant could escape the vaccine" when a) the most likely worst case scenario is it reduces effectiveness b) there's no evidence yet it reduces hospital admissions and death's certainly not to a big degree and c) even if it somehow renders a vaccine next to useless it can be modified quickly but unfortunately context doesn't scare people.
The whole lockdowns/restrictions etc haven't been about completely eradicating it or saving every life, if the vaccines prevent hospitalisations and death's to the points health systems can cope then that's the main aim of the vaccine, anything else is a bonus at this point.
Here's the piece from the FT with the important bits (that you won't see in the sensational headlines) in bold.
The Oxford/AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine does not appear to offer protection against mild and moderate disease caused by the viral variant first identified in South Africa, according to a study due to be published on Monday.
Although none of the more than 2,000 patients in the study died or was hospitalised, the findings, which have not yet been peer reviewed, could complicate the race to roll out vaccines as new strains emerge.
In both the human trials and tests on the blood of those vaccinated, the jab showed significantly reduced efficacy against the 501Y.V2 viral variant, which is dominant in South Africa, according to the randomised, double-blind study seen by the Financial Times.
“A two-dose regimen of [the vaccine] did not show protection against mild-moderate Covid-19 due to [the South African variant]”, the study says, adding that efficacy against severe Covid-19, hospitalisations and deaths was not yet determined.
The so-called Kent variant — which Oxford university said on Friday was just as susceptible to the vaccine as older variants of the virus — has now acquired the E484K mutation, which is present in the variants fuelling Covid-19 surges in Brazil and South Africa.
There are caveats to the study, as the sample sizes were relatively small. The study, led by South Africa’s University of the Witwatersrand and Oxford university, enrolled 2,026 HIV negative individuals, with a median age of 31. Half the group was given at least one dose of placebo, with the other half receiving at least one dose of vaccine.
Tulio de Oliveira, who heads the Network for Genomic Surveillance in South Africa, told the Financial Times the findings were a “wake-up call to control the virus and increase the response to Covid-19 in the world”.
Health authorities worldwide hope vaccines will reduce or completely eliminate the burden of hospitalisation, which would allow for lockdowns to be eased.
While important, it is relatively less urgent to avert symptomatic, but milder, infection that does not progress to hospitalisation.
Any setback for the efficacy of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine would be particularly crucial for the developing world, as the partners are producing billions of doses on a non-profit basis during the pandemic.
The vaccine still appears to be fully effective in preventing hospitalisation and death caused by other variants of coronavirus, according to data from other studies.
AstraZeneca initially declined to comment. It later said it had not been able to properly ascertain the effect of the vaccine on severe disease and hospitalisation caused by the South African variant in the study given most of the participants were young, healthy adults.
“We do believe our vaccine could protect against severe disease, as neutralising antibody activity is equivalent to that of other Covid-19 vaccines that have demonstrated activity against more severe disease, particularly when the dosing interval is optimised to 8-12 weeks,” it said. It added that other immune responses, such as T-cells, may protect against disease. Initial data, it said, indicated those responses “may remain intact” against the South African variant.
It noted that it had begun to adapt the vaccine against this variant with Oxford, advancing rapidly through clinical development “so that it is ready for autumn delivery [if] needed".
Oxford declined to comment on the results of the study, saying only that it was working with partners across the globe, including in South Africa, to evaluate the effects of new variants on the first generation of its Covid vaccine.
“Oxford is working with AstraZeneca to optimise the pipeline required for a strain change should one become necessary,” the university said. “This is the same issue that is faced by all of the vaccine developers, and we will continue to monitor the emergence of new variants that arise in readiness for a future strain change.”
The University of the Witwatersrand did not respond to requests for comment. South Africa’s Department of Health did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
While all Covid-19 vaccines so far have largely held up against the B.1.1.7 variant that emerged in the UK, the strain that originated in South Africa has been more worrying. Both Johnson & Johnson and Novavax have said their vaccines were less effective against the strain in clinical trials conducted in South Africa. In trials, both vaccines offered complete protection against severe disease and death in relation to Covid-19.
Moderna has said it will test a booster shot and a reformulated vaccine to target the South African variant, after studies showed its vaccine was significantly less effective.
BioNTech/Pfizer said their vaccine was slightly less effective in a lab study using a pseudovirus with some mutations from the 501Y.V2 variant, but have not published results of tests against the variant itself.
The 501Y.V2 variant, dominant in South Africa, has recently been discovered in countries all over the world, including the US and the UK.
South Africa took delivery of 1m doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine last week, the first Covid-19 vaccines to arrive in the country, as part of a 1.5m dose order from India’s Serum Institute.
Although none of the more than 2,000 patients in the study died or was hospitalised, the findings, which have not yet been peer reviewed, could complicate the race to roll out vaccines as new strains emerge.
In both the human trials and tests on the blood of those vaccinated, the jab showed significantly reduced efficacy against the 501Y.V2 viral variant, which is dominant in South Africa, according to the randomised, double-blind study seen by the Financial Times.
“A two-dose regimen of [the vaccine] did not show protection against mild-moderate Covid-19 due to [the South African variant]”, the study says, adding that efficacy against severe Covid-19, hospitalisations and deaths was not yet determined.
The so-called Kent variant — which Oxford university said on Friday was just as susceptible to the vaccine as older variants of the virus — has now acquired the E484K mutation, which is present in the variants fuelling Covid-19 surges in Brazil and South Africa.
There are caveats to the study, as the sample sizes were relatively small. The study, led by South Africa’s University of the Witwatersrand and Oxford university, enrolled 2,026 HIV negative individuals, with a median age of 31. Half the group was given at least one dose of placebo, with the other half receiving at least one dose of vaccine.
Tulio de Oliveira, who heads the Network for Genomic Surveillance in South Africa, told the Financial Times the findings were a “wake-up call to control the virus and increase the response to Covid-19 in the world”.
Health authorities worldwide hope vaccines will reduce or completely eliminate the burden of hospitalisation, which would allow for lockdowns to be eased.
While important, it is relatively less urgent to avert symptomatic, but milder, infection that does not progress to hospitalisation.
Any setback for the efficacy of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine would be particularly crucial for the developing world, as the partners are producing billions of doses on a non-profit basis during the pandemic.
The vaccine still appears to be fully effective in preventing hospitalisation and death caused by other variants of coronavirus, according to data from other studies.
AstraZeneca initially declined to comment. It later said it had not been able to properly ascertain the effect of the vaccine on severe disease and hospitalisation caused by the South African variant in the study given most of the participants were young, healthy adults.
“We do believe our vaccine could protect against severe disease, as neutralising antibody activity is equivalent to that of other Covid-19 vaccines that have demonstrated activity against more severe disease, particularly when the dosing interval is optimised to 8-12 weeks,” it said. It added that other immune responses, such as T-cells, may protect against disease. Initial data, it said, indicated those responses “may remain intact” against the South African variant.
It noted that it had begun to adapt the vaccine against this variant with Oxford, advancing rapidly through clinical development “so that it is ready for autumn delivery [if] needed".
Oxford declined to comment on the results of the study, saying only that it was working with partners across the globe, including in South Africa, to evaluate the effects of new variants on the first generation of its Covid vaccine.
“Oxford is working with AstraZeneca to optimise the pipeline required for a strain change should one become necessary,” the university said. “This is the same issue that is faced by all of the vaccine developers, and we will continue to monitor the emergence of new variants that arise in readiness for a future strain change.”
The University of the Witwatersrand did not respond to requests for comment. South Africa’s Department of Health did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
While all Covid-19 vaccines so far have largely held up against the B.1.1.7 variant that emerged in the UK, the strain that originated in South Africa has been more worrying. Both Johnson & Johnson and Novavax have said their vaccines were less effective against the strain in clinical trials conducted in South Africa. In trials, both vaccines offered complete protection against severe disease and death in relation to Covid-19.
Moderna has said it will test a booster shot and a reformulated vaccine to target the South African variant, after studies showed its vaccine was significantly less effective.
BioNTech/Pfizer said their vaccine was slightly less effective in a lab study using a pseudovirus with some mutations from the 501Y.V2 variant, but have not published results of tests against the variant itself.
The 501Y.V2 variant, dominant in South Africa, has recently been discovered in countries all over the world, including the US and the UK.
South Africa took delivery of 1m doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine last week, the first Covid-19 vaccines to arrive in the country, as part of a 1.5m dose order from India’s Serum Institute.
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Came sooner than I expected I admit, also I thought they would sort to age within a cohort, do 69 then 68 etc, but they don't seem to have. Preston are banging ahead, and the main vaccination centre here isn't even open yet, also ahead are Bolton and Blackburn. Wigan behind. We got a text off the doctor, so if you're not sure whether your doctor has your current mobile number I'd drop a note through their door.
You’re absolutely obsessed with accusing the media of scaremongering. It’s very strange. The narrative here is “OMG these strains might be resistant to the vaccines” because that is literally what’s happening. We’re seeing hard evidence of reduced efficacy, according to the primary endpoint of the studies which have investigated this. That’s a fact.
It’s possible (maybe even probable) they still prevent serious illness/deaths but we don’t know this yet. It hasn’t been proven. It’s not a fact. The numbers aren’t there for us to be certain, one way or another.
Going through a long article and highlighting all the bits in bold that are the most optimistic is a weird way to try to understand what they’re telling you. There’s a lot of important stuff in that FT article that you’re glossing over. Which is particularly ironic considering how often you accuse the media of being deliberately misleading.
And you're obsessed with defending them at all costs, which is even more strange.
So it's "literally what's happening" is it? So it's completely neutralized the vaccines to the point people have had them have no protection whatsoever and are just as likely to be hospitalised with the new variants as they were with the old before they got vaccinated? Because that's what the headlines that you are passionately defending are implying.
What the hell are you on about now? What headlines? I haven’t referred to any headlines, never mind passionately defending them. This is as random as that time you brought up Piers Morgan!
What is literally happening is that we are seeing resistance to these vaccines with new strains. As I said, that’s a fact. And no, vaccine resistance doesn’t mean they don’t work at all. Where did you get that idea from? Have you seen it in one of the headlines that wind you up so much? Where did you read it?
I never said it didn't reduce effiicency (nice try though) I said the headlines and wording of some "reports" make it sound like they will completely escape a vaccine and we will be back to square one, not only is that unlikely but if it God for bid did happen they can modify them pretty quickly. I've seen a lot of people on various platforms shit themselves thinking that variants will render vaccines useless and while yes that is partly on them for not reading the small print these people know full well some won't.
Also as a United fan you more than anyone should be wary of the MSM given their borderline bullying of Pogba.
It's a specific problem and we're only seeing early data, but the news from the AZ trial is worrying. They saw minimal efficacy against symptomatic covid. They can't tell us anything about protection against hospitalisation/death because the test group didn't show us that.
It adds to the detail from the Novavax trial that past covid infection didn't seem to protect against the new variant.
It's not scaremongering it's a warning that we need to know more about the mutations and do more to bring down the total number of cases (aka mutation opportunities) as fast as we can - through a combination of vaccination and other measures. It's not a UK issue, it's a global one, but there's a good chance that we'll need a booster vaccine by next winter even if we do run a successful rollout this spring/summer.
Isn’t it odd the efficacy is so much less than J&J considering they’re similar vaccines? Also can someone explain this theory that because the U.K. strain of COVID is more transmissible than the SA one it’ll actually help keep it at bay as it will remain dominant - even with vaccination as many won’t get sterilisation through vaccination. If you catch one strain I thought you could also catch the SA one?
I can’t make any sense of that theory tbh. Apart from anything else, if there’s as big a difference as it seems in terms of their ability to infect people who’ve been vaccinated against or previously infected with “normal” covid then there’s potentially a huge pool of vulnerable hosts for the SA variant to exploit where the UK variant can’t even get its foot in the door.
This is going to cause some very tough questions about opening up again after vaccinating all the elderly/vulnerable. You’d want to be very confident about vaccination preventing serious illness from the SA variant before you start to ease off on the social distancing etc and it sounds like we’re a good bit short of that right now.
Agree - that theory make no sense to me either. It’s an absolute sickener this to be honest. I have absolutely zero faith in our test and trace ability to keep the spread of the SA variant low if we open up again.
One potential silver lining is if my eyes aren’t deceiving me these trials were done on the 4 week dosing pattern which had a much lower efficacy anyway. I have no idea why they’re so useless at conducting trials.
I think some of it is that for AZ we may only have limited results, not enough to really know for sure what we're comparing. We might have more idea when the full report becomes available, rather than the press clippings version of the data.
Things we know. J&J only looked at moderate/severe cases. It looks like AZ looked at mild cases as well, which is potentially significant in statistical terms. J&J didn't actually sequence the positive cases, so we don't know what the mutation percentage was - people are assuming that they were all the mutation version, but the trial timeline suggests a mix. J&J use a similar design to AZ but they do use a modified spike protein design - a feature they share with the mRNA vaccines and the Novavax.
Lots of variables, lots more work for the research teams to do.
I really think the dosing pattern could be important. Looking back a 4 week dosing interval only gave 52%. They’ve showed that 12 week interval increases that to 82% with higher levels of antibodies. The efficacy here with the 4 week pattern is 22% on a smaller group. Crucially even with that initial 52% efficacy nobody had severe disease and the Govt. today are saying Oxford confident it will prevent hospitalisations/deaths. Maybe it’s still not all doom and gloom.
Yup. That looks like 4 week dosing. Also very young/healthy population. Which explains why nobody (either on vaccine or on placebo) ended up in hospital or dead. So it’s a big fecking stretch to talk about the lack of serious illness in the vaccine arm as somehow reassuring.
Have you found the full preprint anywhere? It’s a nightmare trying to interpret this from newspaper coverage and assorted charts on Twitter.
I think it’s published tomorrow. South Africa have suspended vaccinations using it though. Two days ago the PM had a photo op as 1m doses arrived into the country from India. It’s mad how fast this all changes.
Yeah it’s pretty devastating to be honest. My dad is a healthcare worker (over 65) and was probably in line to receive one of the AZ vaccines. Now they’ve cancelled the rollout, so no idea when he’ll get
It could well be the dose timing.
I suspect the AZ team are looking very hard at their old data to try to make sense of it. Sputnik switches adenovirus between doses, AZ doesn't. There's a real possibility that's crucial and that if the AZ doses are too close people react to the adenovirus instead of the spike.
J&J results are from a single dose, but they're trialling a double dose now. I suspect they're looking very carefully at the AZ data as well.
We're unlikely to get much severe case data from that SA group, as it's a really young cohort (under 40). So we may not see a severe case in either the vaccinated or the placebo group. Certainly, I can't imagine it's got enough severe cases to be statistically significant
It’s absolutely shit.
I was listening to a podcast just there which was a long interview with a paediatrician called Paul Offit. He’s virologist/vaccine expert that sits on the FDA committee on covid vaccination. He’s been studying this shit for decades. The podcast episode was from early November and he said he reckoned SARS-COV-2 was stable enough he didn’t think we’d be dealing with any really problematic new strains any time soon. Plus the polyclonal immune response you would expect from a vaccine means a single mutation to the spike protein shouldn’t be enough for significant viral resistance.
Now we’ve got increased transmissibility, possible increased morbidity and vaccine resistance. All come to light in the last two months. What the feck, like?!? Can we not catch a break!!
Sorry to hear that. AZ is so important globally that it's going to hit hard.
Hopefully they can come up with a substitute or a changed protocol or dosing combination fast. I think there will be a lot of attention on the SA/Brazil variants now.
On a more positive note the same podcast made an interesting observation I hadn’t heard before. The long incubation period of SARS-COV-2 is a nightmare for transmission but really good news for immunity.
If a virus has a very short incubation period you need circulating Ab’s to fight it off. Without them you’re goosed. With a longer incubation period it gives you time for memory B cells to kick in and generate new Ab’s. Which means we shouldn’t worry too much about the rapid decline in circulating Ab’s after covid. So that’s good.
If a virus has a very short incubation period you need circulating Ab’s to fight it off. Without them you’re goosed. With a longer incubation period it gives you time for memory B cells to kick in and generate new Ab’s. Which means we shouldn’t worry too much about the rapid decline in circulating Ab’s after covid. So that’s good.
Sorry to hear that. Are you expecting Pfizer any time soon!? Think I read on twitter you’ve ordered J&J too.
Ya I guess the one good thing we need to be grateful for is that it seems these vaccines can be updated relatively quickly.
Ya looks like we are going to use the J&J version for our mass rollout. Apparently we’re getting quite a bit of Pfizer from Covax because we’re one of the few lower/middle income countries that can store it properly. I think they’re going to use Pfizer for healthcare workers and very elderly, and then use J&J and AZ for us plebs.
The error bars are so big I'm not sure any of that data is very meaningful. The sample size is presumably just far too small.
Someone in the Twitter thread commented that the 95% confidence interval is -50% to 60%.
Lets hope it is a sampling artifact or there is some other explanation for the reported low effectiveness.
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Becomes a thing? I had a vaccine passport for years fro typhoid, yellow fever and others. some countries might block your entry if you don't show proof
Yes but you can get those almost on demand, i needed them for my trip to Nicaragua once and had set appointments for every single one within days.
If this one comes out before jabs are widely available for anyone who wants/needs one many young/youngish people who have already (the vast majority without any fuss) given up a large chunk of the prime of their lives are going to be penalized and have even more precious time stuck with nothing but a mere existence.
In the UK it shouldn't be too big an issue because of the speed of rollout but in say Spain at the rate they're currently going their whole population won't be vaccinated until 2032, so what's the plan if they don't speed up? Are they going to deny young Spanish people travel and basic life pleasures for their entire 20's?
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What an odd way to look at it. Without a recognised vaccinated record nobody will be allowed to travel in many cases.
Yes but as I said, the other vaccines needed for Africa, America etc are accessible almost on the spot, this one won't be for quite some time.
The alternative is nobody travels until everyone gets vaccinated just to be "fair" to you.
I think this one comes under the general heading of suck it up princess.
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Saga cruises (for the over 55s) have said that they will require proof of vaccination before you travel with them, which makes sense to me as cruise ships can be floating incubators for infectious diseases. Let's be honest, if you're healthy and in your 20s, Covid is an inconvenience which has probably ruined your social life this last year. For pensioners, it's both that and also something to greatly fear.
Talking to my friends who are in my age group, no-one is complaining about the social restrictions - they're just all scared of catching Covid. If they can start getting some relief from that in terms of being able to take a holiday, that's a good thing in my book. The young people have a lot more life ahead of them to do all the things they want to do, they can wait a while longer.
First of all it will not be that slow, second, it should, because as you said, is fecking pleasure. Spanish have and amazing country to enjoy. You can't go to the beaches on Cuba? there are beautiful beaches in Spain. You can't go to the Andes? there are the Pirinees and many other ranges. You can't enjoy pad thai in bangokok? gastronomy is excellent. museums? they have it. And like this, every single country. Safety first. travelling should be banned if not for essential travelling while there is risk of contagion.
Also, being vaccinated doesn't mean that you can't transmit it depending on the vaccine (as far as I know)