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Vaccine hopes rise as Oxford jab prompts immune response among old and young

reuters.com

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Re: Vaccine hopes rise as Oxford jab prompts immune response among old and young

#451

Post by ksk »

0xffff2 wrote: post #295
SECProto wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> (like we have for literally every single fatal illness) Smallpox. And if you consider within the borders of a given country, a dozen others (polio, measles, mumps, rubella, chickenpox).

Which countries have eliminated the latter 4? I would consider an illness "eradicated" if the vaccine is no longer regularly given. At least 10 years ago (when I was in the field), MMR and Chickenpox vaccines were still regularly administered in the US.

>I would consider an illness "eradicated" if the vaccine is no longer regularly given.

That's not how it works. Just because you don't see an outbreak for a while, that is never a reason to stop immunizing children. Pathogens can and do have natural reservoirs. This is why when some idiots stopped taking the Measles vaccines we had an outbreak here in the US.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_reservoir

Re: Vaccine hopes rise as Oxford jab prompts immune response among old and young

#452

Post by lostlogin »

EpicEng wrote: post #391
ponker wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But for this disease that's particularly bad because Covid has shown to be worst in 55+, obese, comorbidities, etc... which means that the trials on healthy groups are proving very little, since the virus itself is so much weaker on healthy groups.

>But for this disease that's particularly bad because... Doesn't change the fact that, when you're developing a new drug, you want to test it in a way which will cause the least harm. You don't begin trials with those most at risk for obvious reasons. The primary goal of this phase it to asses the safety of the vaccine candidate. I'm also unaware of any disease that isn't more threatening to people in relatively poor…

> I'm also unaware of any disease that isn't more threatening to people in relatively poor health.

I had to think a while - sickle cell anaemia and malaria. I’m sure there will be others.

Re: Vaccine hopes rise as Oxford jab prompts immune response among old and young

#453

Post by 0df8dkdf »

samwillis wrote: post #205
zoobab wrote: post #116

Good news for US BigPharma Merck holding the Oxford patents, while public funding has paid for its research: https://archive.is/aGUJd

Could you please indicate where you heard that Merck has any ownership of the patents to the Oxford vaccine? The cited article indicates that it’s is AstraZeneca who have done a deal with Oxford and that the deal with Merch, while an early option, fell though. Is would seem “US BigParma” are not involved, as AstraZeneca is a British/Swedish company.

AstraZeneca is BigPharm! May not be as Merck or Pfizer, but they are on the big ones.

Re: Vaccine hopes rise as Oxford jab prompts immune response among old and young

#454

Post by scrumbledober »

jedberg wrote: post #408
ageitgey wrote: post #69

A quick summary of were the Oxford vaccine stands since it's hard to follow: - When will the vaccine be ready? After the Phase 3 efficacy data is reported, assuming that the data shows that the vaccine prevents COVID or reduces COVID severity. This happens after enough people in the trial get sick with COVID. Then they unblind the groups and see if the people who got sick were in the control group or the vaccinated g…

The most interesting part to me is that we require some people to get sick. Which totally makes sense. But what if the vaccine happens to be 100% effective? Do we ever get to end the trial?

yes because people in the control group would get sick. Once a certain amount of people get sick they see how many of those people were in control vs vaccine group. In your hypothetical, 100% of the sick people would be from the control group.

Re: Vaccine hopes rise as Oxford jab prompts immune response among old and young

#455

Post by jedberg »

scrumbledober wrote: post #454
jedberg wrote: post #408

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The most interesting part to me is that we require some people to get sick. Which totally makes sense. But what if the vaccine happens to be 100% effective? Do we ever get to end the trial?

yes because people in the control group would get sick. Once a certain amount of people get sick they see how many of those people were in control vs vaccine group. In your hypothetical, 100% of the sick people would be from the control group.

Ah this is true. Thanks. I was thinking that some number of vaccinated people had to get sick.

Re: Vaccine hopes rise as Oxford jab prompts immune response among old and young

#457

Post by tathougies »

bufferoverflow wrote: post #143
apexalpha wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who cares. I'd gladly give this company a couple of billion if it means they can get us back to normal. Oxford develops the vaccine with public money. We also, god willing, need to manufacture billions of them and transport them around the globe. For that manufacturing, give me a solid existing multinational with a proven manufacturing record and base please, not some non-profit startup.

I care. Just like about the bailouts. Socializing the funding/losses and privatizing the profits is just pure corruption.

How is this any different than a government bond program meant to finance the projects? Whether the profit is derived via increased stock price, or derived from interest paid by the government directly through taxes, how is it fundamentally different? The government can't typically just print money (to keep the economy okay). It has to either derive tax to get the funds, or borrow, which again privatizes the profit (in the form of interest).

Re: Vaccine hopes rise as Oxford jab prompts immune response among old and young

#458

Post by ksk »

geuis wrote: post #304
sanketskasar wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is the same. But you cannot expect a vaccine to work similarly in people of two different regions having major differences in their diet, climate and lifestyles. That's why many vaccine candidates are being tested in multiple countries( read potential markets). Also, I think the UK has preferential rights at least on the initial yield of the vaccine.

I don’t think you understand how the biology of vaccines work.

They are correct. Each country wants data showing that the vaccine works for their local population. These ideas are firmly based in Science.

Re: Vaccine hopes rise as Oxford jab prompts immune response among old and young

#459

Post by cpmsmith »

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #194
benlumen wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you might be surprised. The government knows that this is the silver bullet they need to rescue the economy from oblivion. I’m expecting that once this thing is ready there’ll be a logistical effort for the history books to roll it out. See what they can do with the military involved, like the nightingales.

Sad to say, given how testing, lockdown, etc. has proceeded, I'm losing confidence that most western governments are capable of any "logistical efforts for the history books" at this point. I heard a lot of bluster about testing here in Ontario in the spring, but here we are in the fall with rationing of tests again.

For what it's worth, our testing has steadily increased since then. Perhaps we ought to expect more than "steadily", but the recent rationing is more to do with dramatic uptick in demand for tests (schools reopening, immediately followed by Thanksgiving) than with a change in capacity.

There's no way (AFAICT) to link to it directly, but try charting "Total tests completed in the last day" and "Under Investigation": https://data.ontario.ca/dataset/status-of-covid-19-cases-in-...

Re: Vaccine hopes rise as Oxford jab prompts immune response among old and young

#460

Post by artursapek »

input_sh wrote: post #62
calvinv wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

if we're back to normalish by spring next year I think that would be a great outcome, if the messaging to the public would be, buckle down until then I think lockdown complaince could go up

I think you're vastly overestimating our capacity to build enough vaccines and distribute them over the world, as well as dealing with those who will refuse to vaccinate. Even if we had a vaccine ready for the roll-out today, I don't see us going back to normalish until late 2021 at earliest. As with any vaccine, you'd need about 80% of the population to vaccinate in order for herd immunity to kick in. I feel like we…

> dealing with those who will refuse to vaccinate

What's there to deal with? Let people make that personal choice and leave them alone.

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