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It took two days to develop Moderna’s vaccine

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Re: It took two days to develop Moderna’s vaccine

#101

Post by Darmody »

jancsika wrote: post #89
btilly wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are more correct than you probably realize. As http://cis471.blogspot.com/2012/08/seeding-internet-cost-gov... lays out, the government spent $25 million on ARPAnet, the first packet switched network and the granddaddy of our current Internet. So it was actually the same figure as this grant. (There were followup investments from the government, but the whole thing was around $125 million.)

So $25 million on a decentralized system to spread the idea not to wear a mask or social distance during a pandemic, and another $25 million on a vaccine.

Is that the only thing you get from the internet? I'd say that more like a small price to pay in order to have something really great.

Re: It took two days to develop Moderna’s vaccine

#102

Post by enraged_camel »

tialaramex wrote: post #18
kemiller2002 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is the silver lining for this pandemic. Covid-19 is lethal, I'm not discounting that, but in terms of real lethality, this was a good test run to show that this approach works. (At least in my lay person's knowledge.) What really scares me are the highly lethal flu strains (I think H5N5?) The fact that we can produce a vaccine this quickly now gives me hope when we encounter a scenario like out of the mo…

High lethality is often associated with reduced transmissibility. Which makes sense - dead people certainly aren't going to cough on you. In a Sci Fi movie maybe the virus has a long delay, you're infectious for a month with no symptoms, then drop dead in seconds. But in the real world that's less likely the more extreme it gets. One thing that did make this virus more dangerous was that many humans became infectious…

>> High lethality is often associated with reduced transmissibility.

I think the scariest combo would be long incubation time + transmissibility while asymptomatic + high lethality when symptoms appear. This type of virus would spread far and wide before it’s detected, and would also be very deadly.

Re: It took two days to develop Moderna’s vaccine

#103

Post by Razengan »

mrits wrote: post #71
JohnJamesRambo wrote: post #47

I’m glad to see this and we need to concentrate on speeding this process up. This isn’t the last pandemic and all things considered this one was a pretty benign one to have to fight. The next one might not just kill mainly the old and weak and might need much more than a mask (that we still can’t get people to wear!) to prevent its spread. Hopefully before then, we can work to get everyone more on the same page and h…

To get worse than COVID you'd need a virus that takes a long time to develop symptoms and then has a high death rate. In that scenario there would be a lot more public fear and we'd have an easier time keeping people at home. So I'm still of the opinion it's harder to have a worse situation than COVID.

Better yet, a virus (or some other kind of infectious agent, how about a fungus next?) that spreads rapidly but has no symptoms, and may lay dormant for over a year until it receives certain infrequent but not rare triggers, upon which it kills the host quickly.

Let's say pregnancy, a new Star Wars movie, or birth; transferred from parent to child, "activates" inside the newborn and then kills the parents too.

Re: It took two days to develop Moderna’s vaccine

#104

Post by lostlogin »

matz1 wrote: post #56
tialaramex wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

High lethality is often associated with reduced transmissibility. Which makes sense - dead people certainly aren't going to cough on you. In a Sci Fi movie maybe the virus has a long delay, you're infectious for a month with no symptoms, then drop dead in seconds. But in the real world that's less likely the more extreme it gets. One thing that did make this virus more dangerous was that many humans became infectious…

>Elimination strategy works If the strategy is 'everybody stay at home' then it work in the same way shot gun works in eliminating cancer. It works but the cure is worse than the disease.

It’s normal here in NZ and with the exception of borders, restrictions were removed a fair while ago. The economy is considerably better off than most expected too.

https://i.stuff.co.nz/business/123696832/gdp-jump-of-14-per-...

Re: It took two days to develop Moderna’s vaccine

#105

Post by zbrozek »

tehjoker wrote: post #23
causality0 wrote: post #6

I wonder if any, or if many, Moderna employees have been walking around off-the-books immunized since January. I know I would've been tempted.

Probably not since January, but maybe after the phase 1 trials and the dosing schedule was figured out. To be honest, if it doesn't come out that they were using it off the books, either they're suckers or we are.

Would it even be a problem if they did? Like presumably people are generally free to do things to themselves. If they self-administered and they were allowed to consume the resource (e.g., it wasn't theft) who was harmed?

Re: It took two days to develop Moderna’s vaccine

#106

Post by renewiltord »

djohnston wrote: post #27
seafoam wrote: post #8

I could write Twitter in a weekend.

You're being downvoted but the point is valid. To say that this was built in two days is to completely ignore the near decade of investment into mrna vaccines. Total nonsense.

That's not relevant. The point is that Moderna had a low-latency solution when the moment showed itself. It isn't that it's easy. It offers some thinking that their technology is revolutionary and that perhaps we need to revisit our calculations to see if the risk/reward means we should attempt earlier roll out.

We know, this time with hindsight, that it would have saved hundreds of thousands of lives and billions of dollars if we'd used their product on day 3.

Can we develop a protocol that can tell us that so we can use this tech on day 10 next time? Then we can save those lives.

Re: It took two days to develop Moderna’s vaccine

#107

Post by coding123 »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAQ_Ef-OqrI

India's death rate has been much lower than the US. Part of this is because they're already doing widespread cholecalciferol roll-out.

If cholecalciferol is not on 2021's CDCs/FDA/AMA number one recommendation list for pre-Covid control, I will have considered the AMA a complete and utter failure in the united states.

Edit: Also https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ha2mLz-Xdpg

Re: It took two days to develop Moderna’s vaccine

#108

Post by fortran77 »

Two days...and 15 years.

But this is a very exciting and important development. Akin to a moon landing.

How many diseases will be treatable or curable in the near future with this technology? Do any cancers have characteristics that can be used to direct our immune systems to go after them with this technology? I suspect a few might.

Re: It took two days to develop Moderna’s vaccine

#109

Post by oblio »

scottlocklin wrote: post #83
oblio wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The internet? :-)

The jury is still out on that one.

The internet? I think we can all agree that the wheel and writing were some of mankind's greatest inventions.

Yet I can use writing to send a letter to someone so that they try to hurt you with a breaking wheel, if you get what I mean ;-)

Re: It took two days to develop Moderna’s vaccine

#110

Post by fortran77 »

coding123 wrote: post #107

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAQ_Ef-OqrI India's death rate has been much lower than the US. Part of this is because they're already doing widespread cholecalciferol roll-out. If cholecalciferol is not on 2021's CDCs/FDA/AMA number one recommendation list for pre-Covid control, I will have considered the AMA a complete and utter failure in the united states. Edit: Also https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ha2mLz-Xdpg

Don't underestimate how much of the US's problem (and UK, Canada, etc) was caused by obesity, too.

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/09/why-covid-19-more-de...

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