COVID-19: Vaccine and testing procedures Megathread Part 2 [Mod Warning - Post #1]

GT89

GT89 wrote: »

How is that best practice would have thought it was basic hygiene to protect the person giving and the person receiving the vaccine.

It's better to have clean hands than dirty gloves.

Gael23

Had high hopes for AstraZeneca. Quite disappointing

Cork2021

brickster69 wrote: »

AZ delivery cut by 60%

https://news.sky.com/story/covid-19-astrazeneca-to-cut-covid-19-vaccine-delivery-to-eu-by-60-reports-12195923

When you read through the article it’s only the first batch that’ll be disrupted.

“We will be supplying tens of millions of doses in February and March to the European Union, as we continue to ramp up production volumes,” the spokeswoman added.”

Cork2021

It is a hiccup but I’ve high hopes for the J&J one shot being approved within the next 4/5 weeks that’ll be the real game changer!
Pfizer and Moderna supply will only increase after the blip this week.
Keep the heads up!! We’re only in the first 10 mins of this championship final!!

Happydays2020

Gael23 wrote: »

Had high hopes for AstraZeneca. Quite disappointing

BREXIT.

snowcat

GT89 wrote: »

How is that best practice would have thought it was basic hygiene to protect the person giving and the person receiving the vaccine.

Gloves are only as clean as the gloves. In the food industry the blue glove practise has been a disaster for food hygiene. Some Staff wear the blue glove and then handle money, different food types, go for a smoke/toilet and all is ok because they are wearing gloves. The blue glove is not designed for one use application. It is designed for cleaning surfaces and hand protection against chemicals. They are expensive and hence staff do not change them after every use. Borderline dangerous and pointless.

ACitizenErased

I find the British governments mortality claims today utterly bizarre.
The report from the NERVTAG (New and Emerging Respiratory Virus Threats Advisory Group) today states:
"If there is an increase in the severity of infection with VOC B1.1.7, we would also expect to see an increase in the risk of hospitalisation. Currently, we do not have evidence of an increased risk of hospitalisation in individuals with VOC B1.1.7 but data are limited due to lags in the availability of hospitalisation data."

The British government continue making these bizarre claims with zero epidemiological evidence.

Cork2021

ACitizenErased wrote: »

I find the British governments mortality claims today utterly bizarre.
The report from the NERVTAG (New and Emerging Respiratory Virus Threats Advisory Group) today states:
"If there is an increase in the severity of infection with VOC B1.1.7, we would also expect to see an increase in the risk of hospitalisation. Currently, we do not have evidence of an increased risk of hospitalisation in individuals with VOC B1.1.7 but data are limited due to lags in the availability of hospitalisation data."

The British government continue making these bizarre claims with zero epidemiological evidence.

Its covering up their fûck ups!

Flippyfloppy

ACitizenErased wrote: »

I find the British governments mortality claims today utterly bizarre.
The report from the NERVTAG (New and Emerging Respiratory Virus Threats Advisory Group) today states:
"If there is an increase in the severity of infection with VOC B1.1.7, we would also expect to see an increase in the risk of hospitalisation. Currently, we do not have evidence of an increased risk of hospitalisation in individuals with VOC B1.1.7 but data are limited due to lags in the availability of hospitalisation data."

The British government continue making these bizarre claims with zero epidemiological evidence.

Same government who wanted to go for herd immunity and advised people that anti inflammatories would make covid worse

odyssey06

Flippyfloppy wrote: »

Same government who wanted to go for herd immunity and advised people that anti inflammatories would make covid worse

That advice re anti inflamnatories originated with the French iirc

NeuralNetwork

I think there's a bit of hysterical commentary on this. AstraZeneca is doing their best to meet the demand and have a manufacturing glitch on a product that has been taken into production at absolute record speeds.

Pfizer and BioNTech are trying to expand capacity which can't be done without taking some production out of service to enhance it. You either put up with the disruption, or you continue to produce at inadequate volumes. Which do people want?

What's the point in all this political outrage at organisations that are frankly doing their best and a damn lot more than many of the Italian politicians threatening to sue them or the angry commentators on some of the forums. I know it's on trend to hate big pharma, but it's hardly going to do any good. They can't do the impossible and they do not appear to be holding back delivery for any reason. It just wouldn't make any sense.

People need to be aware of how extremely complicated it is to get a production facility that large and that sophisticated running even in normal times, let alone right now under enormous pressure.

You're talking about producing vaccines for a population of 447 million people (including kids) and billions when you look at the global demand.

They're going to get this stuff delivered and in seriously large volumes. Glitches are going to happen in a situation like this.

Gile_na_gile

brickster69 wrote: »

AZ delivery cut by 60%
https://news.sky.com/story/covid-19-astrazeneca-to-cut-covid-19-vaccine-delivery-to-eu-by-60-reports-12195923

Whoever is at the top of the EU vaccine programme needs to be demoted and replaced. This whole programme is a joke because it has no public figure and needs a tough bruiser at the top, woman or man.

Were this programme being run properly, with actual risk assessment, we would be running double the required production facilities where possible, providing beyond demand and exporting the rest as part of our contribution to COVAX. Instead, we have a half-arsed approach where we set up one facility for each vaccine, and then, quelle surprise, problems arise and set back our unrealistic schedules.

The same could happen with J&J, just as it has with Pfizer and AstraZeneca. Thousands will continue to die every day because the most important jobs in history are being assigned to junior staff rather than people who get stuff done.

Note: Like others, I follow the thread to be more informed and calmer about what is to come. I'm sure there will be better news when Pfizer ups their production and J&J comes through, but at the moment there isn't a whole lot to report that is positive.

brickster69

Gile_na_gile wrote: »

Whoever is at the top of the EU vaccine programme needs to be demoted and replaced. This whole programme is a joke because it has no public figure and needs a tough bruiser at the top, woman or man.

Were this programme being run properly, with actual risk assessment, we would be running double the required production facilities where possible, providing beyond demand and exporting the rest as part of our contribution to COVAX. Instead, we have a half-arsed approach where we set up one facility for each vaccine, and then, quelle surprise, problems arise and set back our unrealistic schedules.

The same could happen with J&J, just as it has with Pfizer and AstraZeneca. Thousands will continue to die every day because the most important jobs in history are being assigned to junior staff rather than people who get stuff done.

Note: Like others, I follow the thread to be more informed and calmer about what is to come. I'm sure there will be better news when Pfizer ups their production and J&J comes through, but at the moment there isn't a whole lot to report that is positive.

They are trying to speed things up a bit now

https://twitter.com/MacaesBruno/status/1352640009933873152/photo/1

NeuralNetwork

I'd agree the programme wasn't ambitious enough and it seems to have been focused on cost control rather than volume and urgency. I don't really think this was a situation where delivering maximum value for money was the priority somehow, yet that's what seems to have happened.

There's been a general lack of understanding of the urgency of all this and we are spending probably trillions in economic costs due to direct impact on the economy and that isn't including the human costs.

I think there's been a slow ratcheting up of the level of concern in a lot of countries, including here, when you realise how this thing can keep coming back and isn't really controllable without technical solutions like vaccines. One misstep and you've a mess and endless threats of lockdowns. A lot of the decisions made over the summer were in a period of relative calm.

I just think the raging that's going on at the companies trying to produce the vaccine is a bit ridiculous though.

You can't snap your fingers and magic up a giant vaccine plant.

funnydoggy

brickster69 wrote: »

They are trying to speed things up a bit now

https://twitter.com/MacaesBruno/status/1352640009933873152/photo/1

That is hilarious to be fair :pac:

ACitizenErased

ACitizenErased wrote: »

Does anyone actually have some journal articles about this so called increased mortality and decreased vaccine efficacy that the Brits are claiming?

ACitizenErased wrote: »

I find the British governments mortality claims today utterly bizarre.
The report from the NERVTAG (New and Emerging Respiratory Virus Threats Advisory Group) today states:
"If there is an increase in the severity of infection with VOC B1.1.7, we would also expect to see an increase in the risk of hospitalisation. Currently, we do not have evidence of an increased risk of hospitalisation in individuals with VOC B1.1.7 but data are limited due to lags in the availability of hospitalisation data."

The British government continue making these bizarre claims with zero epidemiological evidence.

I heard them today mention that the Israeli stats don't look good. Which they don't unless you look at people actually vaccinated.

For anyone who's wondering, if you hear differing things on a subject it's usually safe to ignore what the UK government are saying.

titan18

brickster69 wrote: »

They are trying to speed things up a bit now

https://twitter.com/MacaesBruno/status/1352640009933873152/photo/1

That's satire right?

Stark

Don't think so. Not the first time I've heard the bit about translating the instruction booklet mentioned.

NeuralNetwork

Stark wrote: »

Don't think so. Not the first time I've heard the bit about translating the instruction booklet mentioned.

How long can that take? A day? They're not that complicated and they would be pretty standard text.

A team of specialist translators would have that done in an afternoon.

There are technical translators working all the time on this kind of thing and churning out entire medical text books.

If true, this is utter nonsense and needs to be sorted out NOW.

titan18

Stark wrote: »

Don't think so. Not the first time I've heard the bit about translating the instruction booklet mentioned.

Well FML then. I'm not even sure how to describe how I feel about that in a civil manner that won't get me banned.

If anyone has a spare half hour the below is the first of 4 videos some guy did about evolution.

It's very accessible and well-explained. It may seem a bit simple but it shows how tiny changes in individuals can make massive population changes. Different "species" in the video rise and fall and just as one becomes dominant another comes along with an ever so slight improvement that allows it to dominate. These improvements don't have to be dramatic to make a huge big-picture change.
In terms of "reproduction", bear in mind that that is the only goal. So in the video the criteria are set. In the case of a virus being able to spread more easily is beneficial. But so is a longer incubation time, lower mortality etc.

titan18

NeuralNetwork wrote: »

How long can that take? A day? They're not that complicated and they would be pretty standard text.

A team of specialist translators would have that done in an afternoon.

There are technical translators working all the time on this kind of thing and churning out entire medical text books.

If true, this is utter nonsense and needs to be sorted out NOW.

Based on experience in a red tape environment, it would not surprise me if that's whats slowing it down. Someone will likely translate it, it'll go through an approval process, amendments will be asked for and when it's finally approved, there'll be some official who checks his emails once a day to rubber stamp them all. So something that takes a developer (in my case) or a translator a few hours to do becomes a much longer drawn out process.

Leftwaffe

Where’s the data to show that the SA variant reduces vaccine efficacy? Is there any freely available?

Didn’t the vaccine makers say they will still work against new variants only like last week?

Itsaduck1

[Deleted User] wrote: »

For anyone who's wondering, if you hear differing things on a subject it's usually safe to ignore what the UK government are saying.

Should we have heeded the advice on the strain they informed the world of in December that makes up 40% of our cases now?

Boris might be a buffoon, but UK have some of the finest scientists in the world advicing that government. I'm not convinced its more deadly, but I'll listen and not jump to a conclusion

Flippyfloppy

odyssey06 wrote: »

That advice re anti inflamnatories originated with the French iirc

It did, but the UK backed it up in the media AFAIK

Gile_na_gile

titan18 wrote: »

Well FML then. I'm not even sure how to describe how I feel about that in a civil manner that won't get me banned.

It seems to be an older story that was not reported in the mainstream press, so it might be filed with bendy bananas. Nevertheless, even as satire or anti-Western propaganda (like that guy who tweeted it?), there is some degree of verisimilitude.

Itsaduck1

Itsaduck1 wrote: »

Should we have heeded the advice on the strain they informed the world of in December that makes up 40% of our cases now?

Boris might be a buffoon, but UK have some of the finest scientists in the world advicing that government. I'm not convinced its more deadly, but I'll listen and not jump to a conclusion

As I said, ignore the UK government. I had their press conference on this evening and several times he went against what was being reported earlier in the day and he didn't get called up on it.

Itsaduck1

El Sueño wrote: »

If the data about the vaccine effectiveness on the SA variant is "in the public domain" does someone have a link to it?

Dr Fauci said today efficacy may fall to 80% for that strain.Is he still a credible source?

Leftwaffe

Itsaduck1 wrote: »

Dr Fauci said today efficacy may fall to 80% for that strain.Is he still a credible source?

Jesus Christ. Is this strain everywhere?

Edit: This is 8 hours old and is all I can where he talks about new variant and vaccines. He says they will still work here? Unless I’m reading it wrong.

https://www.medpagetoday.com/infectiousdisease/covid19/90833

Irish Stones

brickster69 wrote: »

AZ delivery cut by 60%

https://news.sky.com/story/covid-19-astrazeneca-to-cut-covid-19-vaccine-delivery-to-eu-by-60-reports-12195923

I remember when I said that people were too positive about vaccine roll out and that it was possible that the time line could have not been met.
And I remember when someone said that no glitches in the process were to be expected, and I was being too negative and had to shut up.

Now I'm not saying that things are going to be bad, but it's better to expect that the roll out may be slower than planned and hoped.