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Pfizer Covid vaccine approved for use next week in UK

bbc.com

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Re: Pfizer Covid vaccine approved for use next week in UK

#301

Post by mellosouls »

rootsofallevil wrote: post #296
mellosouls wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Much of what you say is true, but doesn't negate the point of the comment you are assuming the motivation of. The UK national infrastructure does have a history of dubious at best procurement, outsourcing and "consultancy" decisions in supplying it's services - those public services often then coming under extreme criticism from the same quarters as your attack - who are often the same private sector blowhards who ca…

> does have a history of dubious at best procurement That is a very tactful way of describing what has gone on in this country for a while

Exactly, and it isn't in itself wrong to point it out.

Re: Pfizer Covid vaccine approved for use next week in UK

#302

Post by tinus_hn »

_Microft wrote: post #294
tinus_hn wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So are you saying the UK cut corners?

That's one of the possibilities I had in mind when I started the thread. Look at my top level comment so see what I asked exactly.

The answer to that is two-fold, of course. In the US and UK any hold-up is going to be blamed on the government, while in the EU it’ll be blamed on some nebulous, far away EU institution which is not elected anyway.

Second one country might care more about a lot of people dying unnecessarily (besides the burden on the economy) than another. Clearly the EU has no issue with it and prioritizes theatrics instead. Again, probably has to do with the ease of blame shifting.

Neither of these have anything to do with the typical excuses about ‘thoroughness’.

Re: Pfizer Covid vaccine approved for use next week in UK

#303

Post by refurb »

ulrikrasmussen wrote: post #158
mystcb wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

UK Gov originally published this as the priority interim list [1] - * older adults’ resident in a care home and care home workers * all those 80 years of age and over and health and social care workers * all those 75 years of age and over * all those 70 years of age and over * all those 65 years of age and over * high-risk adults under 65 years of age * moderate-risk adults under 65 years of age * all those 60 years…

In Denmark where I live, a large proportion of infected people are age 20-29, and I wonder if it would make sense to vaccinate them first when you get to "rest of the population". Even though they have a smaller risk of getting seriously ill, that could be an effective way to lower transmission. That is: 1. Immunize the age group that is dominating in the hospitalization statistics, then 2. Immunize the age group is…

There are people far smarter than I am developing plans for this, but I'm assuming the thinking is "it's better to vaccinate the person who could die from Covid than to vaccinate the person who could potentially give it to them".

I have no doubt there are some pretty interesting models being developed to determine the best course of action.

Re: Pfizer Covid vaccine approved for use next week in UK

#304

Post by rootsofallevil »

_opc6 wrote: post #290
swores wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Even when people in the UK should be celebrating, as literally the first country in the world to develop an approved C19 vaccine in record breaking time The UK has one of the first (Oxford/AstraZenica), but this news about the first approved is not a vaccine developed in the UK. But I'm still happy to celebrate the Turkish couple's German company that's owned by Pfizer, as I will be when Oxford hopefully release mo…

It's strange how we immediately take pride in stuff we had nothing to do with just because we identify in some way with the developers/creators.

> Patriotism is the belief that your country is the best by virtue of you having been born in it

I can't find the original quote but I 100% agree with you that it is pretty odd to take pride in something you have an extremely tangential relationship with

Re: Pfizer Covid vaccine approved for use next week in UK

#305

Post by spuz »

nmca wrote: post #151
bealesd wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it has been shaky, it has > 90% success rate (1.) when administered as a half dose followed by a full dose. 1. https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/nov/23/oxford-covid...

My understanding is that that trial condition (half->full) was administered accidentally (thus not pre-registered) and nobody expected it to work better, and the sample size is small and on the wrong age groups.

This doesn't matter though. The results are still valid.

Re: Pfizer Covid vaccine approved for use next week in UK

#306

Post by refurb »

samcheng wrote: post #65
WanderPanda wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Happy beta testing to all Brits then!

The 'beta' test already happened. Tens of thousands of people have proven it safe and effective. Haven't you been following the news? Selfishly, I guess we should be happy that there is an anti-vaxxer sentiment; it means the rest of us will get our vaccines faster.

proven it safe and effective

Having worked in the pharmaceutical industry, if I ever said my FDA approved drug was "safe and effective" I'd have the FDA dropping the hammer on me.

The FDA does not prove a drug is safe. No drug is 100% safe. The FDA determines whether the risks of the treatment are outweighed by the benefit.

I have no doubt that additional safety signals will pop up from Covid vaccines as the treated population expands by 100x. Most likely they will not be severe and the risk will still outweight the benefit.

But to say "we've tested the vaccine on a 15,000 people so we know it's safe to vaccinate 1B+ people" is not something the FDA would agree with.

Re: Pfizer Covid vaccine approved for use next week in UK

#307

Post by tgb »

shusson wrote: post #117
headmelted wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a question for someone who's heavily schooled on mRNA vaccines and/or a practitioner involved in the trials for this particular vaccine. Not that I have a problem with your asking the question, I just don't think an opinion poll on a tech board is going to yield an accurate prediction of what to expect.

> I just don't think an opinion poll on a tech board is going to yield an accurate prediction of what to expect. Part of your answer, which I'm paraphrasing to "I don't know, talk to the experts", is already a good answer. But I was hoping that there was an expert lurking around that might be able to explain the risks or link to some evidence.

You asked what "people on HN" think which is not exactly the top way to fish out experts.

Re: Pfizer Covid vaccine approved for use next week in UK

#308

Post by matz1 »

shusson wrote: post #71

Out of curiosity, how do people on HN rate the risk of long term side-effects?

Its interesting that some people worry about long term side effect of vaccine but not worry about long term side effect of lockdown.

Vaccine is good but my biggest worry is if the same kind of virus happen again, it will become justification for lockdown until the vaccine exist.

Re: Pfizer Covid vaccine approved for use next week in UK

#309

Post by cblconfederate »

The question is what will be the rate of vaccinations rather than who begins first (though, the sooner the better really). Less risky groups won't be so eager to get vaccinated ASAP, so there will slower adoption after the initial wave of vaccinations. In a few months we ll be assessing what needs to be done to reach herd immunity levels.

Re: Pfizer Covid vaccine approved for use next week in UK

#310

Post by spuz »

J-dawg wrote: post #238
samcheng wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 'beta' test already happened. Tens of thousands of people have proven it safe and effective. Haven't you been following the news? Selfishly, I guess we should be happy that there is an anti-vaxxer sentiment; it means the rest of us will get our vaccines faster.

Conversely, I am finding the reaction to anti-vaccine sentiment from some politicians to be pretty creepy. Already there is talk of compulsory vaccination or "vaccine passports". Labour (the UK opposition party) were even calling for spreading "misinformation" online to be illegal. I find this ridiculous considering the massive challenge we have ahead of us just to get the vaccine to the millions of people who desper…

I'm not sure I agree. The maths says that we need about 70% of the population to take the vaccine in order for it to no longer be a threat. We also have polling that says about 53% will refuse to take the vaccine. So we're already at the point where something else must be done such as adding incentives, a passport system or better advertising etc. OR continued lockdown measures and enforcement of mask wearing. It's not a theoretical problem we're already there.

https://www.itv.com/news/2020-11-10/covid-vaccine-will-enoug...

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