Covid-19 vaccines and vaccinations

Snow Leopard said:
India could make more than enough doses, not only for themselves but for other countries - if not for the fact that the corporations who own the intellectual property have decided to maximise profit and only grant exclusive licenses (Serum Institute of India) nor not grant licenses at all because there is no money to be made.
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I won't get into politics, but PM Modi failed the people of India and now they need urgent help.

In early March PM Modi assured PM Trudeau that they would do their best to support Canada's vaccination efforts. We were desperate. We temporarily suspended the AZ vaccines and they were sitting in fridges. Now Canada has decided to extend the expiration dates for second jabs of AZ. I hardly find that noble when India is dealing with a catastrophe.
 
Getting my first dose of vaccine tomorrow. Pfizer.

My GP surgery texted me yesterday to invite me to come for the vaccine. I was planning to wait a bit, because as a housebound person I'm at much less risk than others in my age group, but since the GP surgery has got the doses, it would make no sense to not get it whilst they're offering it.
 
Mij said:
My point from BurnA post was that we should donate/share more of our vaccines with underdeveloped/poorer countries and not vaccination our 12 yr olds right now.

India has 1.2 billion people, and with new variants developing, we will be back at square one if we don't contain the transmission. New variants are a lot more transmissible now.
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To be honest I think we can do both. Rich countries have hoarded way more vaccines that they need (I saw a graphic on Twitter yesterday... I think it was something like, Canada has 10 doses of vaccine per member of the population. And UK below that but still much more than the 2 doses needed per person. So rich countries should be giving all their unneeded doses away.
 
Let me address emergence of variants. If billions are not vaccinated then many variants will arise. Some will be breathrough viral strains, where the vaccines work very poorly. Then we get more pandemic waves, new vaccines, new variants, more pandemic waves escaping control through vaccines. It might not ever end.

Now agains this the world is showing a Covid decline overall, in large part due to vaccines, though changing weather conditions does modify risk too. Over time we will have more and more vaccine capacity.

Some countries are now working on their own vaccines. China and Russia are giving away huge numbers of vaccine doses, with the potential to displace established pharma and become more trusted over most of the world. Big pharma could mostly lose most of their markets, entirely through their own inactions and market competition, plus state agencies pushing their own products.

I have no problem with pharma making profit off of vaccines. However with huge markets the profit should come from volume not price hikes. Also there is the question of what happens when new variants arise and pharma keeps high profit margins. They have a financial intererst in NOT eliminating the disease. We saw the downside of this in the history of H. pylori and gastric ulcers.

If the West does not step up then China and Russian and probably India in the medium term will totally dominate the world pharma scene. This will be a disaster for Big Pharma. It will be better for the world however. So my suggestion to Big Pharma is do everything to mass produce their products all over the world, and take only a minimal profit, gaining profit from volume of sales instead of price gouging.

The answer in a pandemic is to plan for everyone to have the opportunity for vaccination. Yes, including teenagers if the science continues to show its worth doing. Plus the billions in the rest of the world. Its not either/or, its how do we get everyone vaccinated the fastest and most efficaciously?
 
alex3619 said:
I have no problem with pharma making profit off of vaccines. However with huge markets the profit should come from volume not price hikes. Also there is the question of what happens when new variants arise and pharma keeps high profit margins.
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Bourla (CEO of pfizer has said that the bulk of the profits will come from first World countries and that they have a tiered pricing.

wealthier nations would have to pay in the range of about the cost of a takeaway meal and would offer [the vaccine] to their citizens for free . . . middle-income countries were offered doses at roughly half that price and . . . low-income countries were offered doses at cost."
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alex3619 said:
They have a financial intererst in NOT eliminating the disease.
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Doesn't that logic apply to all vaccines?
 
"low-income countries were offered doses at cost."

China and Russia are providing vaccines for FREE and gaining influence. The US did give away a lot of not approved AZ vaccine though. (Not approved in US)
 
Snow Leopard said:
I'm not convinced this is a great success given COVID case numbers are high and increasing in countries that have mostly relied on the BBIBP-CorV vaccine (Such as Mongolia and Bahrain), despite almost 60% of the population being vaccinated.
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Actually, looking at Mongolia, those numbers do encourage me. The vaccine is not slowing new cases, but deaths are coming down. However this could entirely be an artefact of reporting. Many countries have poor or biased reporting, so its hard to be sure.

Bahrain is different. Deaths are rising, but case numbers down. Deaths typically get worse for a bit even if numbers are down.

Also in both cases the vaccination rate might still be low.

Further, and I have not looked at the data for these vaccines, vaccines sometimes (like Astrazeneca) have higher post vaccine infection rates but still much lower death rates. We have to wait for some months to see what happens, and even then this will only be effective if reporting is accurate.

No matter the case the political benefit from making vaccines free will be huge, even if they are not the best vaccines.

I am hopeful that as the Western vaccine manufacture accelerates, such as with Astrazeneca, more and more will be available to many countries. mRHA vaccines are less likely to be ramped up in dramatic numbers, largely due to holding onto the technology. There are valid reasons to do so quite aside from profit, but it has political ramifications.
 
alex3619 said:
Actually, looking at Mongolia, those numbers do encourage me. The vaccine is not slowing new cases, but deaths are coming down. However this could entirely be an artefact of reporting. Many countries have poor or biased reporting, so its hard to be sure.
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It's more than just the last week or two that is important to consider.

Notably, in Mongolia, they're now trying to secure supply of the Pfizer vaccine to be offered as boosters...
 
@Sarah94

I haven't been vaccinated yet, but I am concerned about the type of chairs we have to sit on to wait the 15 minutes. Something most people wouldn't even think about.

Hoping I get a home visit soon so I can jump in my bed and relax after.
 
erm....Public Health England has apparently released some rather 'questionable' statistics re pfizer and AZ vaccines and effectiveness against 'serious' hospitalizations after 2 doses. at 96% and 92% respectively.

These figures may indeed be accurate, I have no way of judging that, but what strikes me is they have no reference point, and appear to be being used to suggest that without the vaccines then all those vaccinated people would be require serious hospitalisation.

Which is total BS as far as I know - a very small percentage of people, unvaccinated, ended up being admitted to hospital, let alone being in need of serious hospitalisation.

The problem, from the NHSs perspective, wasn't the percentage, it was that so many people were being infected.

So what these figures actually say, it seems is that for pfizer you have a 4% chance of needing serious hospitalisation, and for AZ an 8% chance.

My quibble is what percentage of unvaccinated people needed 'serious hospitalisation', adjusting for the age ranges involved (as we've run out of old peoples homes to seed and......

Shouldn't we be being told how much better 2 shots of each vaccine is compared with nothing, rather than an inverted form of the numbers who end up in hospital in a serious condition even after the vaccines?

the whole thing is just 'dishonest' IMO.
 
Wonko said:
Shouldn't we be being told how much better 2 shots of each vaccine is compared with nothing, rather than an inverted form of the numbers who end up in hospital in a serious condition even after the vaccines?

the whole thing is just 'dishonest' IMO.
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It's funny that the journalists are not reporting the fact that one dose of Pfizer had greater effiacy against hospitalisation than two doses of AZ.

That three month wait for the second AZ dose isn't so great...

https://khub.net/web/phe-national/p.../document_library/v2WsRK3ZlEig/view/479607266
 
If you read the Guardian ( hard copy), on page 9 today there is a lot of data entitled " Data -Cases, deaths and admissions down but two thirds still vulnerable." Diagrams with dots representing people.

Also explanations and diagrams of why the Delta variant is a significant threat, and figures for protection rates after the 2 doses of both vaccines used in U.K. The rates differ. AZ is less effective.

I cannot read this critically - brain fog and heat. Every time I think I get it straight in my head, I come across a statistic from another source that jumbles me up again. I will try and see if I can find an online copy and edit it in if I do, so others can read for themselves.

eta: I seem to need an account to get above article online which I can't seem to get even though I-have an account for the hard copy.

eta2: I apologise for the incoherence of the above. I really am hot and brain fogged but when I skimmed through the article, I was quite shocked at some of the statements about how vulnerable we still are against Delta variant, even with 2 jabs. I haven't changed my life to go out more since being vaccinated and don't really plan to, except for hoping to see my grandchildren, but it still shocked me.

eta3: from the Guardian yesterday. It contains much of the information referred to above.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...but-charts-show-right-delay-reopening-england
 
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Binkie4 said:
If you read the Guardian ( hard copy), on page 9 today there is a lot of data entitled " Data -Cases, deaths and admissions down but two thirds still vulnerable." Diagrams with dots representing people.

Also explanations and diagrams of why the Delta variant is a significant threat, and figures for protection rates after the 2 doses of both vaccines used in U.K. The rates differ. AZ is less effective.

I cannot read this critically - brain fog and heat. Every time I think I get it straight in my head, I come across a statistic from another source that jumbles me up again. I will try and see if I can find an online copy and edit it in if I do, so others can read for themselves.

eta: I seem to need an account to get above article online which I can't seem to get even though I-have an account for the hard copy.

eta2: I apologise for the incoherence of the above. I really am hot and brain fogged but when I skimmed through the article, I was quite shocked at some of the statements about how vulnerable we still are against Delta variant, even with 2 jabs. I haven't changed my life to go out more since being vaccinated and don't really plan to, except for hoping to see my grandchildren, but it still shocked me.

eta3: from the Guardian yesterday. It contains much of the information referred to above.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...but-charts-show-right-delay-reopening-england
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watching TWIV (podcast about viruses) right now. Most of it goes right over my head, but the virologists featured are not especially impressed with the Delta variant.

They are saying that the time and place of its introduction May account for it’s apparent greater transmissibility, more specific data is needed to draw a reliable conclusion. On the other hand in England they say that it does transmit to a larger number of people within a household, so that’s evidence.
. I’ve been in a state of complete brain fog since getting the vaccine, so I’m not sure if what I just speak’n spelled makes any real sense
 
For people who are overweight or obese this article on vaccination is important to know - not just for Covid but any future vaccination you might get.

https://www.theguardian.com/comment...ccinated-against-covid-fatphobia-runs-rampant

A registered nurse I spoke to explained to me that the Covid vaccine, just like the flu vaccine, is designed to be given into the muscle. “The needle usually used for this is 25mm long, but it is recommended to use a 38mm needle in fat people as the needle needs to pass through a more subcutaneous fat layer to reach the muscle,” she said. “All Covid immunisers in Australia are required to complete training provided by the Australian government, and this training advises that 38mm needles are required ‘for individuals with obesity’.”

When I asked if this was a new requirement, the nurse told me “a study in 1997 found that the amount of fat over the deltoid muscle where we have our vaccines injected varies, especially for women. If a vaccine made to be injected into the muscle is injected into the fat layer, this has less blood flow than the muscle and the immune reaction likely won’t be as strong.”
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I am curious about whether NHS staff are aware of this.
 
Mij said:
I used 38mm needles when I injected IM with magnesium sulfate and I'm slim. I think they should use this size for all IM injections.
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Thank you for mentioning that, it's reassuring. I was thinking silly things like "Am I fat enough for the longer needles?" "Will they touch bone and really hurt?" "Could they poke me in major arteries by mistake?" :D
 
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