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Denmark to permanently cease using AstraZeneca vaccine

reuters.com

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Re: Denmark to permanently cease using AstraZeneca vaccine

#81

Post by hef19898 »

sdeframond wrote: post #72
hef19898 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Slowely I'm getting the impression that a lot of decisions around AZ are politically driven. In Germany, the new recommendation is now to use Biontech for the second shot after AZ. In that recommendation, it is also stated that there are no studies nor data supporting that. Quite funny, because there is, to my understanding, a study taking place in the Uk for that. It is expected to be done by end of April. Someone h…

I was getting the impression that pretty much any government decision around COVID-19 was politically driven, not just AZ. Actually that does not even sound very surprising.

Yeah, sounds about right. Having elections only seems to make these things worse.

Re: Denmark to permanently cease using AstraZeneca vaccine

#82

Post by 0-_-0 »

londons_explore wrote: post #53

This decision seems illogical to many commenters here, but I assume the decision was made by professionals with all the data in front of them. Which then raises the question, why did these professionals make a decision so different than the "obvious" opinion here?

Because it's a kind of a trolley-problem that makes people make wrong decisions because of how society assigns blame. If the vaccine kills 1 person, they can be held directly responsible for that death. However, if the lack of vaccine kills 100 people, their deaths are the result of COVID, and would not be considered the result of the decision. In trolley problem terms, they would be blamed for pushing someone in front of the train to save others, but not for their inaction leading to a larger number of deaths.

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

Re: Denmark to permanently cease using AstraZeneca vaccine

#83

Post by dandellion »

rsynnott wrote: post #39
alkonaut wrote: post #3

Not giving it to 65+ people seems overly cautious. There are zero cases in that group and even just a small delay will mean many dead. This is trading a potential unlikely side effect for a large number of severe Covid cases in high risk groups. Edit: yes I'm aware they have only a dozen or so dead per week but that also translates to hundreds of severe cases, missed elective surgeries, etc. For what would most likel…

_Are_ there unvaccinated over-65s in Denmark? AIUI it's generally a bit ahead of the EU curve, and over-70s are generally done in most European countries.

I had to look up "AIUI" because I didn't understand your comment, it turns out it's a capitalization for "as I understand it", so you basically made your comment less readable to avoid typing 15 characters, which at a modest typing speed will take about 3 seconds to type. So if you've read this far it means it's already been a negative return to type the shortcut.

Re: Denmark to permanently cease using AstraZeneca vaccine

#84

Post by thrower123 »

jsnell wrote: post #68

There's a very special kind of arrogance going on in all the comment threads about the Covid vaccine suspensions. These decisions are being made by professionals. They have been trained to do exactly this kind of decision. They have access to the best possible data on both the risks of the vaccine, the risks of Covid in their local context, and the impact these decisions have on the national vaccination schedules. Bu…

The evidence has consistently shown that the experts have a track record of making terrible decisions that trend towards covering their own asses, and then coming up with The Science to justify their decisions post-hoc.

Re: Denmark to permanently cease using AstraZeneca vaccine

#85

Post by joakleaf »

Tenoke wrote: post #59
vinni2 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Denmark as low number of cases and down to 7 day average of 2 deaths. Assuming they have lockdown measures in place they aren’t risking much from dropping AstraZeneca.

Exrended lock down measures aren't without costs either.

Denmark has been slowly opening up the last month (schools/daycares/offices) and will continue to open shopping centers and restaurants the coming months.

A Plans for opening up travel to other countries and returning without quarantines during the coming months are in place.

We do very rigorous testing, and the number of cases/deaths has not risen over the last month despite opening up parts of society, so the assumption is that we can open up more (carefully).

Denmark is number two worldwide with respect to tests per inhabitant with 5.1 million tests for each 1 million inhabitants (i.e. 5.1 tests per inhabitant). Generally less than 0.5% of the tests are positive

Re: Denmark to permanently cease using AstraZeneca vaccine

#86

Post by ThePhysicist »

The EU will phase out the usage of AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson's vaccines entirely, according to Reuters [1]. Instead they plan to focus on mRNA approaches like Biontech/Pfizer and Moderna.

[1] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronovirus-eu-vac...

Re: Denmark to permanently cease using AstraZeneca vaccine

#87

Post by kmlx »

jsnell wrote: post #68

There's a very special kind of arrogance going on in all the comment threads about the Covid vaccine suspensions. These decisions are being made by professionals. They have been trained to do exactly this kind of decision. They have access to the best possible data on both the risks of the vaccine, the risks of Covid in their local context, and the impact these decisions have on the national vaccination schedules. Bu…

> These decisions are being made by professionals.

sure, but there are "professionals" on the other side of the debate that say the opposite. thus, discussions will happen.

also, these kinds of bans automatically lead to people across the planet not getting the vaccine due to fear.

case in point: a hard-hit European country got 1.3 million AZN doses. 800k are unused as no one wants to use them. the population would rather wait for the "good" vaccines :)

Re: Denmark to permanently cease using AstraZeneca vaccine

#88

Post by mhb »

jsnell wrote: post #68

There's a very special kind of arrogance going on in all the comment threads about the Covid vaccine suspensions. These decisions are being made by professionals. They have been trained to do exactly this kind of decision. They have access to the best possible data on both the risks of the vaccine, the risks of Covid in their local context, and the impact these decisions have on the national vaccination schedules. Bu…

One obvious reason is that, in all this time, none of these professionals have explained their decision in terms of costs/benefits. So either they are not thinking in those terms or they don't think it is worth sharing the basis for their decisions. Let's see their models.

Re: Denmark to permanently cease using AstraZeneca vaccine

#89

Post by marvin »

londons_explore wrote: post #53

This decision seems illogical to many commenters here, but I assume the decision was made by professionals with all the data in front of them. Which then raises the question, why did these professionals make a decision so different than the "obvious" opinion here?

From Norway, where I wouldn't be surprised if authorities arrive at the same conclusion in next few days, it can be summarized pretty quickly:

-Risk of death from side effects in - >65 population is largely vaccinated already

-Vaccines from other manufacturers are expected to be available for everyone shortly

-Covid is under control and new cases are few. Risk of dying from infection in a given month is extremely low. When risk of death from vaccine is estimated at the order of 1 in 50.000, (ballpark figure based on memory), the vaccination risk outweighs Covid risk by far. Would be a tough call if other vaccines wouldn't be available, but they will be. It's not a long delay.

-Given the above, it's crucial to make sound ethical decisions to maintain public's trust in vaccinations and health authorities. This is not the last time we need to trust health authorities with our wellbeing.

In closing, summarized very briefly: there is a lot of orthodoxy regarding vaccination strategy in the community of science-interested folks. It's very fascinating to watch part of this consensus being challenged with good scientific arguments.

Re: Denmark to permanently cease using AstraZeneca vaccine

#90

Post by mamon »

0-_-0 wrote: post #82
londons_explore wrote: post #53

This decision seems illogical to many commenters here, but I assume the decision was made by professionals with all the data in front of them. Which then raises the question, why did these professionals make a decision so different than the "obvious" opinion here?

Because it's a kind of a trolley-problem that makes people make wrong decisions because of how society assigns blame. If the vaccine kills 1 person, they can be held directly responsible for that death. However, if the lack of vaccine kills 100 people, their deaths are the result of COVID, and would not be considered the result of the decision. In trolley problem terms, they would be blamed for pushing someone in fro…

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