Canada's 'gamble' on delaying, mixing and matching Covid-19 vaccines paid off • Hacker News Board

Re: Canada's 'gamble' on delaying, mixing and matching Covid-19 vaccines paid off

#51

Post by roenxi » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 7:37 AM UTC

coronqueue wrote: post #45

roenxi wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If holding employment, catching a train or attending a festival are conditional on having a drivers license then I'm unhappy about that too. The explicit purpose of this is to exclude people from society if they disagree with the government's cost/benefit calculations. There is evidence in the article that the vaccines reduce the risks of COVID by 2-3 orders of magnitude, which gets it into the range of a bad flu. We…

Where is your data to support your extraordinary claim that "a lot of people have already had COVID and pose a lower risk than someone who is vaccinated"? https://arstechnica.com/science/2021/10/prior-infection-vs-v... "The CDC researchers found that people previously infected but unvaccinated were 2.34 times more likely to get reinfected than people who were previously infected and fully vaccinated." "The researcher…

Your source is comparing reinfection risk. Reinfection risk is very low [0]. It can't drive a pandemic.

And, fairly critically, it is crazy to start isolating people from social life over that low reinfection risk. You've been exposed to people who are unvaccinated for all sort of dangerous diseases through your life and nobody has tried to lock them out of society for that.

EDIT I suppose I'll throw in here this isn't about whether vaccination is good or not. Anyone who hasn't made up their mind at this point isn't persuaded by evidence. This is about how to treat people who make choices that the government disagrees with. Locking them off aeroplanes isn't the way.

[0] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8209951/

Re: Canada's 'gamble' on delaying, mixing and matching Covid-19 vaccines paid off

#52

Post by angelzen » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 7:37 AM UTC

coronqueue wrote: post #45

roenxi wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If holding employment, catching a train or attending a festival are conditional on having a drivers license then I'm unhappy about that too. The explicit purpose of this is to exclude people from society if they disagree with the government's cost/benefit calculations. There is evidence in the article that the vaccines reduce the risks of COVID by 2-3 orders of magnitude, which gets it into the range of a bad flu. We…

Where is your data to support your extraordinary claim that "a lot of people have already had COVID and pose a lower risk than someone who is vaccinated"? https://arstechnica.com/science/2021/10/prior-infection-vs-v... "The CDC researchers found that people previously infected but unvaccinated were 2.34 times more likely to get reinfected than people who were previously infected and fully vaccinated." "The researcher…

I wish people stopped the over-reliance on antibody studies. I get it, it's fun to play with cool technology and great to get papers published. OTOH, antibodies are just a part of the immune system, decay exponentially post infection / vaccination and there is no golden formula to correlate antibody levels with infection risk.

Re: Canada's 'gamble' on delaying, mixing and matching Covid-19 vaccines paid off

#53

Post by ChemSpider » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 7:38 AM UTC

abirkill wrote: post #12

refurb wrote: post #3

“Bold” strategy? Canada had no option if they wanted to vaccinate quickly. Unlike the US and Europe, Canada dragged its heels on pre-ordering vaccines. Once it was apparent they couldn’t control the case numbers without vaccines, they took what they could get, prioritized first doses then realized they had different vaccines delivered for 2nd doses. The fact the mixed vaccines gives good protection is more luck than…

Out of the three vaccines in use in both Canada and Europe, it appears that Canada entered agreements as follows: Moderna: August 5th, 2020 [1] Pfizer: August 5th, 2020 [1] AstraZeneca: September 25th, 2020 [2] Europe entered agreements as follows: Moderna: November 25th, 2020 [3] Pfizer: November 11th, 2020 [4] AstraZeneca: August 27th, 2020 [5] I couldn't immediately find data on the quantities ordered, but this do…

Yeah, what they did not expect is the US blocking all exports. All vaccines had to be flown in from Europe, even so the same vaccine was produced just a few miles across the border.

Re: Canada's 'gamble' on delaying, mixing and matching Covid-19 vaccines paid off

#54

Post by twofornone » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 7:41 AM UTC

coronqueue wrote: post #42

ipaddr wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The tracking is through vaccine checkins via vaccine passports. Boarding any travel method in Canada now requires a vaccine checkin. These passports will remain a long time.

Vaccine passports in Canada are implemented using the https://smarthealth.cards/ standard. The QR codes are verifiable offline using digital signatures. The app used in BC is open source and available on Github: https://github.com/bcgov/BCVAX-iOS https://github.com/bcgov/BCVAX-Android It works just fine with the device in airplane mode, and does not maintain a record of the QR codes it has verified.

Yet? Why are you people so trusting when you know that these sorts of apps are one library and one function call away from mass surveillance mandated by some misleadingly titled bill? Surely Canada has a spiritual equivalent to the Patriot Act, no?

Re: Canada's 'gamble' on delaying, mixing and matching Covid-19 vaccines paid off

#55

Post by jwilliams » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 7:47 AM UTC

chroem- wrote: post #21

AlexandrB wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a bizarre comment. What does the efficacy of Canada's improvised mixed vaccination "plan" have to do with implementing a dictatorship? And have you noticed how big and poorly connected rural Canada is? It's pretty easy to get out of range of cell towers and effectively not be trackable. How is the Canadian government going to cover the country with enough infrastructure to monitor where every citizen is in a…

I'm not clear on what GP's connection to vaccinations is, but for what it's worth, Australia has recently implemented some very authoritarian covid policies despite it being sparsely populated. People are only allowed to leave their homes for two hours a day and everyone is required to take pictures of themselves inside their homes at regular intervals to prove their location to the police. Violators are being shot w…

There are some half-truths in there, but otherwise what you're saying is misleading.

For example, there is a (quite small) trial of facial recognition for home quarantine of international travelers. Now that's a topic worthy of discussion - But it's an extraordinary leap to say everyone is taking pictures of themselves (i.e that's just not true at all).

It's similar for most of your assertions.

There have been quite a number of strict rules in different parts of Australia at different times. Most are now being wound back in line with vaccination rates.

Re: Canada's 'gamble' on delaying, mixing and matching Covid-19 vaccines paid off

#56

Post by jbay808 » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 7:52 AM UTC

jszymborski wrote: post #14

defaultname wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Unlike the US and Europe, Canada dragged its heels on pre-ordering vaccines" Canada was one of the first countries to pre-order vaccines, signing massive agreements with just about every candidate maker. I'm aware of literally a single deal happening with another country prior to Canada's orders. What thwarted Canada's efforts was that the US defacto nationalized the medical establishment in that country, while Cana…

Speaking of nationalising the medical industry: Fun fact, Canada was the home of Connaught labs, a publicly owned laboratory which was the first lab to produce the Salk's Polio vaccine, and went on to produce the Smallpox vaccine. In the 1970s, however, Canada went on a privatizing spree (incidentally, the same gov't that ratified NAFTA), and Connaught was privatised and sold many time since. More info here https://w…

Canadian companies contributed significantly to developing these vaccines too.

Vancouver-based Acuitas Therapeutics developed the lipid nanoparticle delivery mechanism for the Pfizer vaccine, for example. There are others as well. This article lists three Vancouver companies:

https://blog.jonasneubert.com/2021/01/10/exploring-the-suppl...

And that's not even mentioning Vancouver biotech unicorn AbCellera, which has developed an antibody treatment.

Re: Canada's 'gamble' on delaying, mixing and matching Covid-19 vaccines paid off

#57

Post by roenxi » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 7:52 AM UTC

ipaddr wrote: post #31

rubyist5eva wrote: post #24

Paid off in what exactly? Many of our provincial governments have implemented totalitarian measures despite an insanely high vaccination rate and low death rate - creating a medically segregated society. In one province, the government has given itself vast power to perform warrantless search, confiscate property and conscript any person to the cause of "managing the emergency". Our courts uphold the measures because…

The government's actions I can understand. The courts decisions based on 'unprecedence' events is troublesome. It creates a low barrier for the removal of any rights. An event will happen like this again.

Not to mention, these events are precdented. This is a 1:40 to 1:100 year pandemic; depending on how much of it has to do with modern airlines.

Re: Canada's 'gamble' on delaying, mixing and matching Covid-19 vaccines paid off

#58

Post by chroem- » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 8:01 AM UTC

nitrogen wrote: post #44

chroem- wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not clear on what GP's connection to vaccinations is, but for what it's worth, Australia has recently implemented some very authoritarian covid policies despite it being sparsely populated. People are only allowed to leave their homes for two hours a day and everyone is required to take pictures of themselves inside their homes at regular intervals to prove their location to the police. Violators are being shot w…

everyone is required to take pictures of themselves inside their homes at regular intervals That is... bizarre. Very bizarre. Do you have a link to read more?

An overview: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/09/pandemic-a...

Allowing people to leave their house for up to an hour of exercise: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-58277503

Firing on protesters: https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/sep/21/victo...

Re: Canada's 'gamble' on delaying, mixing and matching Covid-19 vaccines paid off

#59

Post by plazmatic » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 8:03 AM UTC

refurb wrote: post #3

“Bold” strategy? Canada had no option if they wanted to vaccinate quickly. Unlike the US and Europe, Canada dragged its heels on pre-ordering vaccines. Once it was apparent they couldn’t control the case numbers without vaccines, they took what they could get, prioritized first doses then realized they had different vaccines delivered for 2nd doses. The fact the mixed vaccines gives good protection is more luck than…

Damn. What did Canada do to you? So salty. They had a smart strategy here. Give them credit, it paid off.

Re: Canada's 'gamble' on delaying, mixing and matching Covid-19 vaccines paid off

#60

Post by chroem- » Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 8:06 AM UTC

jwilliams wrote: post #55

chroem- wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not clear on what GP's connection to vaccinations is, but for what it's worth, Australia has recently implemented some very authoritarian covid policies despite it being sparsely populated. People are only allowed to leave their homes for two hours a day and everyone is required to take pictures of themselves inside their homes at regular intervals to prove their location to the police. Violators are being shot w…

There are some half-truths in there, but otherwise what you're saying is misleading. For example, there is a (quite small) trial of facial recognition for home quarantine of international travelers. Now that's a topic worthy of discussion - But it's an extraordinary leap to say everyone is taking pictures of themselves (i.e that's just not true at all). It's similar for most of your assertions. There have been quite…

It looks like you are correct that the surveillance app is limited to anyone who has crossed state or national borders in the last two weeks. That being said, the Australian government has not relinquished its emergency powers, and is instead pushing for additional powers such as mandatory internet ID.