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Germany pauses AstraZeneca vaccinations as a 'precaution'

reuters.com

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Re: Germany pauses AstraZeneca vaccinations as a 'precaution'

#151

Post by rocqua »

jonplackett wrote: post #5

Maybe AZ should have charged €3 per shot instead of €2 and spent the extra € on a PR agency. They just seem to be constantly taking a hammering in the press, unfairly I’d say.

The feeling I am getting is that AZ is being less cautious with their promises. What I fear is that they did the same with their fase 3 trials.

I read an unsourced claim on HN a few weeks ago that they did 9 phase-3 trials, and applied for approval on the basis of only 2. Which would be rather bad if true. Moreover, it is clear that their 1.5 dose regimen was a mistake in trial execution.

Meanwhile, the FDA still hasn't approved AZ.

It seems possible that AZ was overeager to present good results, and thus was less cautious than they should have been. It's only a possibility, but its one that worries me.

Anyone here have an source to confirm / debunk the rumor that AZ did 9 trials, and only applied on the basis of 2 trials?

edit: I just looked at the stats in the UK, and it certainly seems like since they started vaccinating cases have dropped off, and deaths have dropped of even faster. Since vaccines are probably targeted at the more vulnerable, it certainly seems to show that the vaccine has very positive net effects.

Re: Germany pauses AstraZeneca vaccinations as a 'precaution'

#152

Post by fenk85 »

giantandroids wrote: post #8

You do have to wonder if some of this is politically driven. Germany are losing hundreds of life's a day, while in the meantime the UK has administrated 23 million doses (not sure the ratio of those that were AstraZeneca) and not recorded a single fatality or adverse reaction and are seeing infection rates / deaths drop. I can understand caution under normal circumstances, but nothing is normal right now.

Perhaps you should consider the death rate per million between UK and Germany first?

Or compare with Ireland next door to UK, if they had same death rate there be about 70K more people alive in UK today

Yet all of that was forgotten in the manufactured in media vaccine nationalism wars

Re: Germany pauses AstraZeneca vaccinations as a 'precaution'

#153

Post by onetimemanytime »

totalZero wrote: post #75
onetimemanytime wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ummmm....we can wait and get another vaccine? The vaccine is done on HEALTHY people, we're not talking about meds on terminal stage cancer patients with nothing to lose.

You can also just expose yourself to the virus and build immunity that way. Up to you.

Nope. They are options, like quarantine, masks, different vaccines. It's not "this vaccine right now or death."

The most sensible thing is to investigate this, maybe more without the vaccine died from thrombosis, but need to see.

Re: Germany pauses AstraZeneca vaccinations as a 'precaution'

#154

Post by amelius »

subltemelt wrote: post #85
drcode wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A problem with bureaucracies is that they often care deeply if people die from an action they are responsible for, but are fine if there are massive deaths due to inaction.

It's interesting because I feel the opposite as an acute care doctor in the US. If I give a medication, or get a scan, or whatever, and the patient has an adverse reaction, it's the medication/scan's fault. If I don't give the medication, don't get the scan, and something bad happens, it's my fault. At least that's how people see it for now. Leads to a lot of over-treatment and extra unnecessary testing in my opinion…

So a more accurate description is: politicians care deeply if people die from an action (or inaction) that went against the public opinion.

Re: Germany pauses AstraZeneca vaccinations as a 'precaution'

#155

Post by macspoofing »

temp-dude-87844 wrote: post #61

Given that some amount of alternate vaccines are available, governments are doing the right thing by "deferring" deployment of this vaccine for a short while, because this move has the highest chance avoiding direct harm to people from medicine (which is often perceived worse than harm that would have befallen people without medicine) and highest chance of avoiding an increase of brand-agnostic vaccine mistrust from…

>Given that some amount of alternate vaccines are available, governments are doing the right thing by "deferring" deployment of this vaccine for a short while, because this move has the highest chance avoiding direct harm to people from medicine

I think so too, especially since AZ is one of the least effective ones available.

Re: Germany pauses AstraZeneca vaccinations as a 'precaution'

#156

Post by hef19898 »

DanBC wrote: post #122
sjwest wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its unfortunate they felt the need to stop the administration of this vaccine, as this will only further slow down vaccine distribution in Germany/Europe. I think you've got it spot on there - it stinks of politically motivated attack, but I'm not clear how this could benefit Germany's politicians slowing down the administration of the vaccine? Maybe they can use this as an excuse for the poor administration rates???…

There's a few things that might be happening. Germany has high rates of vaccine hesitancy. One way to tackle that is to be extra cautious. So, as soon as there's information about problems the vaccination programme is halted, an investigation is carried out, accurate and clear information is then presented showing rates of harm in unvaccinated and vaccinated people, and the programme is restarted.

Yes, in deed we have. As does France.

Re: Germany pauses AstraZeneca vaccinations as a 'precaution'

#157

Post by [deleted] »

jayd16 wrote: post #146
subltemelt wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's interesting because I feel the opposite as an acute care doctor in the US. If I give a medication, or get a scan, or whatever, and the patient has an adverse reaction, it's the medication/scan's fault. If I don't give the medication, don't get the scan, and something bad happens, it's my fault. At least that's how people see it for now. Leads to a lot of over-treatment and extra unnecessary testing in my opinion…

>If I give a medication, or get a scan, or whatever, and the patient has an adverse reaction, it's the medication/scan's fault. What about the Hippocratic oath? First do no harm.

[deleted]

Re: Germany pauses AstraZeneca vaccinations as a 'precaution'

#158

Post by atleta »

verytrivial wrote: post #144

As far as I understand it, the EU member states are not generally short on doses, more on distribution and other regulatory issues. If they pause AZ, they can use something else which is already being manufactured right now, and likely within the EU, quelle surprise. I would not be surprised if this is simply a political and economic snub from the EU, one of very many the UK can expect over the coming decades. The UK…

Depends on how you define short on doses. We have less than what we've planned but we seem to adminster less than we have at the moment.

Re: Germany pauses AstraZeneca vaccinations as a 'precaution'

#159

Post by drcode »

thepangolino wrote: post #128
drcode wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A problem with bureaucracies is that they often care deeply if people die from an action they are responsible for, but are fine if there are massive deaths due to inaction.

How do you explain the lockdowns then?

Lockdowns are enforced inaction, so the logic is counterintuitive in that case.

Re: Germany pauses AstraZeneca vaccinations as a 'precaution'

#160

Post by tablespoon »

It's also worth noting that it seems like Germans perceive the AstraZenica vaccine as second-rate, and were even skipping appointments in the hope of getting the Pfizer/BioNTech shot later.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/25/world/europe/germany-coro...:

> Many people — including health workers — are skipping appointments or refusing to sign up for the AstraZeneca shot, which they fear is less effective than the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, the officials say. As a result, two weeks after the first delivery of 1.45 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine arrived in Germany, only 270,986 have been administered, according to data collected by the public health authority, the Robert Koch Institute.

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