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Oxford University breakthrough on global COVID-19 vaccine

ox.ac.uk

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Re: Oxford University breakthrough on global COVID-19 vaccine

#431

Post by twoslide »

bumby wrote: post #380
MagnumOpus wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The AstraZeneca vaccine also has 90 percent efficacy when used twice No it doesn't. Both dosings use two shots, and the "90%" number from the smaller dosing is from an unreliably small sample set of 33 infections -- it could easily be 70-80% by next month when more data comes in.

Couldn’t the same be said in reverse? I.e., due to sampling error the reports could be amended to a 95% efficacy when more data comes in?

I don't think we know based on public information. Some media report "up to 90%" which suggests the upper bound of the confidence interval, rather than the centre. Could also be a very wide CI, that overlaps with the standard dosage.

Re: Oxford University breakthrough on global COVID-19 vaccine

#432

Post by NeutralCrane »

camkego wrote: post #16

This statement seems a big deal: "There were no hospitalised or severe cases in anyone who received the vaccine" Is that also true of the Pfizer and Moderna trials? Are the various trials measuring 'effectiveness' in the same way? Is there a standard for 'effectiveness' in these Covid-19 trials? It will take some digging and real effort to compare the risks and benefits of the various vaccines coming to market.

> Is that also true of the Pfizer and Moderna trials? Are the various trials measuring 'effectiveness' in the same way? Is there a standard for 'effectiveness' in these Covid-19 trials?

Yes, its true that there were no "severe" cases in the other vaccine trials as well.

> This statement seems a big deal: "There were no hospitalised or severe cases in anyone who received the vaccine"

It may be. When considering disease severity, we are no longer looking at a pool of people who have been given the vaccine (which is in the tens of thousands for all of these), we are looking at a pool of people who got sick. That means the sample size is reduced to approximately 90-100 for placebo wing of each vaccine, and 30 for ChadOx vaccine arm, and about 5 for Moderna/Pfizer vaccine arms each. That's fairly small.

Seems like the estimated rate of severe cases is around 10-20%. Assuming its 10% (which would mean its harder to identify an actual reduction in disease severity rate from the placebo group), then in the case of Pfizer/Moderna, there would be a greater than 50% chance of seeing no severe cases in a group of 5 infected, vaccinated patients, even if there was no effect on the severity of the disease. The greatest benefit to the vaccine is that they seem to prevent infections substantially, but that also means it will take months before enough infections occur to get some kind of statistical significance on if severity is also affected.

But with this vaccine, 30 cases with no infections is definitely in the realm of statistical significance. I don't have the exact numbers from the trial, but if it indeed is 0/30 vs around 10/100 between the vaccine/placebo wings, it definitely meets the typical thresholds of statistical significance.

It's important to note that, at least according to my understanding, the Pfizer/Moderna trials are measuring symptomatic cases, not doing actual tests on their trial participants. This means that it could well mean that the reason the vaccines appear to be so effective is because they truly are reducing the severity of the disease to the point of being asymptomatic. We just aren't able to see it yet due to the way the data is being collected.

Re: Oxford University breakthrough on global COVID-19 vaccine

#433

Post by ghaff »

Scandiravian wrote: post #292
Tinyyy wrote: post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody’s getting a goose laying golden eggs from a covid vaccine. It’s a one time, relatively low-cost vaccine that is going to go out of demand once the population is immunized. Oh, and now there are multiple competitors in the market.

Only if the vaccine gives permanent immunity, which I haven't found any research suggesting that it will. In all likelihood, it will be necessary to give yearly booster shots, so the companies developing the vaccines will be able to sell vaccines every year The quantity of vaccines needed will make even a $0.50 markup worth billions of dollars every year

Vaccines are not a great business in general. (Which is not the same as saying they're unprofitable.) But one reason vaccine makers are generally indemnified against lawsuits in the US, it that at least some companies would probably pull out of making vaccines if they weren't.

Re: Oxford University breakthrough on global COVID-19 vaccine

#434

Post by skocznymroczny »

andy_ppp wrote: post #70

I find it a bit weird that there are fewer asymptomatic cases with this vaccine? Is it somehow increasing the immune response to COVID-19?

The whole concept of 'asymptomatic cases' is dubious to begin with, most likely promoted to increase belief in PCR tests and the whole "new normal" environment.

Re: Oxford University breakthrough on global COVID-19 vaccine

#435

Post by rrss »

jl2718 wrote: post #374

In case anybody was wondering what this actually is: “The ChAdOx1 vaccine is a chimpanzee adenovirus vaccine vector.” They put a corona spike sequence into it. By comparison, the Moderna is making a RNA vaccine, and BioNTech an epitope vaccine (the actual protein). The ‘invasive’ effect is decreasing in that order. Oxford’s ChAdOx1 infects your cells to create RNA, then protein, then T-cell recognition/apoptosis, the…

> BioNTech an epitope vaccine

I think BioNTech's vaccine is also an mRNA vaccine.

https://biontech.de/covid-19

> Our vaccine consists of a short segment of genetic material, called messenger RNA, that provides instructions for a human cell to make a harmless version of a target protein, or immunogen, which activates the body’s immune response against the SARS-CoV-2 virus

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BNT162b2

Re: Oxford University breakthrough on global COVID-19 vaccine

#436

Post by twoslide »

jonplackett wrote: post #417

We (Britain) may have totally screwed up our general response to COVID. But at least we’re still pretty good at science. Thanks Oxford for saving the day.

Also worth noting that we did this by having a board research base that was not tied to immediate returns. A year ago Sarah Gilbert was struggling to get funding for work on the MERS vaccine, which was seen as largely irrelevant.

Re: Oxford University breakthrough on global COVID-19 vaccine

#437

Post by ericmay »

bigmanwalter wrote: post #381
ericmay wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think this is a very good rant. Private companies have investors too, and board leadership varies from company to company.

So true! Anonymous masses vs private fiefdoms. Almost everything commercially successful is run by tyrants. I wish regulating anti-social behaviour out of industry was more popular.

The main issue is identifying what anti-social behavior is. It's easy to say "coal is anti-social! don't you care about the environment!", but it's just as anti-social to just shut down an industry and say "best of luck, I heard you can move to California and build websites in JavaScript". Often times there just aren't easy answers.

I also want to push back on "everything commercially successful is run by tyrants" kind of narrative. I get the frustration, but these blanket, ideological statements do not help anyone, anywhere. Do you make money? I guess you're a tyrant!

Let's not forget, the countries that we put up on a pedestal as the shining examples of how a country should be run (Norway or whatever) are very much capitalistic countries with free markets, IPOs, and commercial companies. I hardly see businesses there characterized as tyrannical.

I do really get the frustration, but it needs to be directed at the failures of our elected representatives. Not, commercial entities.

Re: Oxford University breakthrough on global COVID-19 vaccine

#438

Post by bumby »

Frost1x wrote: post #424
bumby wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you help me understand your point a little better? I think the OP was reflecting on cash flow being used for R&D but your post seems to be more about market capitalization.

The question was simply to stimulate a more holistic view of the example at hand: that Pfizer did this on their own and essentially didn't need/get any financial help. Sure, Pfizer didn't receive direct subsidy in the short term related to COVID R&D and is taking on risk. But let's look at this more holistically. Pfizer and pharma benefit a reasonable amount from public research. Pfizer has received their fair share…

I agree with your overall point that it needs to be looked at holistically, but I don't think I agree with your stance on some of the subsidy arguments.

A subsidy is, by definition, a governmental funding mechanism. "People with illness" who used Pfizer products in the past aren't subsidizing the COVID vaccine anymore than I subsidize an automobile manufacturer making pickups when I buy my tiny hatchback. It's built into the business model and not really a "subsidy".

I agree with you in terms that we shouldn't view these companies as operating in a vacuum, I just don't think the idea of the markets being propped up is the most congruent way of framing the discussion. Pfizer benefited along with most other publicly traded companies, irrespective of their COVID vaccine.

Re: Oxford University breakthrough on global COVID-19 vaccine

#439

Post by [deleted] »

GhostVII wrote: post #331
codeulike wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These stats are based on 130 people getting covid out of an experiment of 25,000 people. They dont give a breakdown of the stats (e.g. who was on placebo, who was on which dosing regimen ) but those are small nubmers. I think its possible that this is just noise. The difference between '60%' and '90%' might just be a handful of cases. They show that it works though, thats the main thing. edit: e.g. of those 130 cases…

Only 2700 people were in the 1.5 dose variant.

[deleted]

Re: Oxford University breakthrough on global COVID-19 vaccine

#440

Post by StavrosK »

moultano wrote: post #396
mantap wrote: post #390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We've subsequently learned that even young healthy and initially asymptomatic people can become permanently ill from so called "long COVID". The ethicists were right to say no.

People join the military not knowing whether or not they will ever go to war, yet they still join. By doing so they risk death, dismemberment, and all manner of long term disability under the belief that doing so makes everyone else safer. If exposing a few people on purpose is a moral wrong, then surely allowing millions of them to contract it by accident so that a few people in your RCT can become infected by chanc…

I don't follow, how is it worse to reach a lot of people in case some of them catch it in an unrelated manner worse than infecting them on purpose?
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