Covid vaccine makers commit to not seek approval until complete Phase III trials • Hacker News Board

Re: Covid vaccine makers commit to not seek approval until complete Phase III trials

#231

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Sep 08, 2020, 9:23 PM UTC

spamizbad wrote: post #71

shajznnckfke wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The virus is pretty bad, right? Ought we be making a cost-benefit analysis where we compare the risks of side effects from the vaccine to the risks of the spread of the virus? In comparison to a vaccine like Gardisil, which surely prevents far fewer deaths than a covid-19 vaccine will, wouldn’t such an analysis actually indicate that the trials be rushed to some extent? I’m feeling anxious that the current political…

The 1976 swine flu outbreak is one example of what can go wrong if you rush a vaccine: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1976_swine_flu_outbreak It was rushed by the Ford administration for political reasons and got a lot of people very sick.

[deleted]

Re: Covid vaccine makers commit to not seek approval until complete Phase III trials

#232

Post by School-Cotton » Tue, Sep 08, 2020, 9:24 PM UTC

CydeWeys wrote: post #225

timr wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Is this the worst-case scenario? It doesn’t sound nearly as bad as covid-19." This is a case where the media hysteria surrounding the risks of Covid isn't helping anyone. If polling is to be believed, the general public significantly overestimates their personal risk of mortality from the virus: https://us.beyondbullsandbears.com/2020/07/28/on-my-mind-the... As noted by the link above, the vast majority of that risk…

> It would be tragic, for example, to see any serious side-effects from a vaccine in people under the age of 20, who have essentially no risk from infection. They have little risk of death if they have no comorbidities, but even for a 20 year old, just getting COVID-19 is likely gonna be worse than the side effects from almost any vaccine imaginable. I've had vaccine side effects and I've had COVID and I'd take ten m…

> just getting COVID-19 is likely gonna be worse than the side effects from almost any vaccine imaginable

Do you have any non-anecdotal articles that quantify this?

Re: Covid vaccine makers commit to not seek approval until complete Phase III trials

#233

Post by mchusma » Tue, Sep 08, 2020, 9:24 PM UTC

I hope that the benchmark for approval is "for a given group, the risk of the vaccine is lower than the risk of COVID".

This has some good commentary: https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2020/09/on... some thoughtful commentary.

I believe that for at risk populations it is very likely that taking a phase III vaccine candidate is the safer option right now, let alone after another month of data.

I think let anyone who wants to volunteer to take it make their own risk assessment but be required to send data back. The only real arguments I have seen against this are political or paternalistic. But I also think people should be allowed to run human challenge studies on volunteers, which is also an ethical no brainier. But that doesn't seem to be happening either.

It basically feel like the world in 2020 decided the answer to the "trolley car problem" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trolley_problem. 2020 society's action seems to be: "inaction causing 5 deaths is better than action causing 1 death".

Re: Covid vaccine makers commit to not seek approval until complete Phase III trials

#234

Post by eanzenberg » Tue, Sep 08, 2020, 9:24 PM UTC

talentedcoin wrote: post #209

SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It just seems terribly dismissive of all the people who want and demand a return to business as usual. A plan for handling the coronavirus that doesn't include "here's when we'll open the bars" is missing a huge piece of the problem.

Idk. I think framing the problem in this way is missing a huge piece of the problem. Just because people want or demand a thing doesn’t mean that we as a society are going to be able to deliver it. I think we need to think seriously about the fact that, even if COVID goes away, lockdowns like this could become part of the “new normal” (?) anyways. And by the time that happens a lot of affected businesses will already…

I can definitely envision fascist-lite elected officials using lockdowns in the future willy nilly, because the people precisely have gone along with it.

Re: Covid vaccine makers commit to not seek approval until complete Phase III trials

#235

Post by SpicyLemonZest » Tue, Sep 08, 2020, 9:25 PM UTC

DoreenMichele wrote: post #224

SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess I'm not sure how to respond. It's not about bars specifically; it's about returning to an environment where people are free to crowd about if they'd like. As long as there are top-down rules to micromanage where I can go and how many others I can go with, the problem isn't solved. "Maybe we should just get used to those rules" isn't a solution - in all but the hardest-hit areas, the rules are most of the prob…

top-down rules to micromanage I don't operate that way. Generally speaking, that's antithetical to how I operate in life. I think if we have more support for remote work for people who want/need it and more support for options like Little Caesar's pizza portal which allows for contactless take-out, that helps make life possible for the most vulnerable people. Given how long people are living and our success in keepin…

Maybe I misunderstood, because I'm on board with everything you're describing here. Most people I've seen who say they don't want to return to "business as usual" mean that we should just have restrictions in place forever, but if we're just talking about additive changes to let people avoid diseases if they'd like, I'm all in favor.

Re: Covid vaccine makers commit to not seek approval until complete Phase III trials

#236

Post by School-Cotton » Tue, Sep 08, 2020, 9:27 PM UTC

garmaine wrote: post #126

RHSeeger wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd rather more people die to Covid than find out 20 million people have failing livers and 5 million were born with birth defects because they rushed a vaccine without enough testing.

COVID has already caused at least that many people to have measurable levels of internal organ damage.

Source?

Re: Covid vaccine makers commit to not seek approval until complete Phase III trials

#237

Post by DoreenMichele » Tue, Sep 08, 2020, 9:28 PM UTC

eanzenberg wrote: post #234

talentedcoin wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Idk. I think framing the problem in this way is missing a huge piece of the problem. Just because people want or demand a thing doesn’t mean that we as a society are going to be able to deliver it. I think we need to think seriously about the fact that, even if COVID goes away, lockdowns like this could become part of the “new normal” (?) anyways. And by the time that happens a lot of affected businesses will already…

I can definitely envision fascist-lite elected officials using lockdowns in the future willy nilly, because the people precisely have gone along with it.

To be clear, I'm actually arguing for finding solutions so that we can put a stop to such things.

I have zero interest in giving government officials any excuse to do such things. Finding actual solutions that actually work is the strongest possible means to combat such an outcome.

Re: Covid vaccine makers commit to not seek approval until complete Phase III trials

#238

Post by s1artibartfast » Tue, Sep 08, 2020, 9:29 PM UTC

kurthr wrote: post #142

gizmo686 wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Covid isn't that bad when compared to the potential harm that a dangerous vaccine could cause when injected into billions of people. Particularly because deploying the vaccine would not immediately stop all the covid19 damage. Further, deploying a dangerous or innefective vaccine would also cause significant long term damage to public health by fueling doubt in healthcare; particuarly since antivaccers are already a…

This is quite simply false based on a worst case scenario of a 1976 Swine Flue vaccine level fallout, which had https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guillain%E2%80%93Barr%C3%A9_sy... Your chance of getting COVID over the next year is certainly greater than 1% even if you live in a fairly unaffected area of the US (and are likely closer to 10% without extreme measures), while your chance of dying is almost 1% and severe effe…

For what it's worth, The infection fatality rate 20-29 I have seen is about 7/100,000. I have seen many drugs with higher death rates form side-effects.

Re: Covid vaccine makers commit to not seek approval until complete Phase III trials

#239

Post by hedgew » Tue, Sep 08, 2020, 9:31 PM UTC

warent wrote: post #52

I've recently heard an argument that the probability of being injured/killed by a vaccine (e.g. due to complications, allergies, etc.) is on average greater than the probability of covid causing damage/fatality to an individual, therefore if people are administered these vaccines then we'll actually see an increase in mortality/illness. Can anyone speak to this? I'm not sure how legitimate this is, but it sounds some…

Try finding out how many people have died from vaccines that have passed phase 1 & 2 in the past few decades.

The number seems to be closer to zero than anything else.

Even one of the worst vaccine disasters, the Cutter incident in 1955, seems to have resulted in only some 10 deaths, of which 5 were indirectly caused.

Re: Covid vaccine makers commit to not seek approval until complete Phase III trials

#240

Post by orwin » Tue, Sep 08, 2020, 9:33 PM UTC

DenisM wrote: post #168

ConsiderCrying wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure why this got downvoted, it's not like the person is endorsing Russia's decision. I'm highly skeptical a country that refused to go on lockdown and underreported cases would make a safe vaccine faster than the rest of the world.

> country that refused to go on lockdown What? Moscow lockdowns were some of the harshest outside East Asia.

I think grandparent meant "refused to go on lockdown on time". I have contacts in khazan ( not sure if orthographied correctly), the harsh lockdowns were due to a miscomprehension of the word "exponential growth" and overused hospitals.