What exactly is happening with AstraZeneca?

robinph · 25-02-2021 11:31PM

astrofool wrote: »

I don't think anyone is saying it's the most dangerous thing ever done.

What most people (and countries) are saying is that it's an unnecessary risk only being taken by one country which is in a position of serious weakness towards the virus due to previous mishandling.

What's also interesting is that they are saying it's because they're not in the EU, when the UK would have been completely free to pursue this strategy when within the EU as well (similarly to their wrong shade of blue passports).

Which is the bigger risk? Vaccinating people or having doses go unused? Does it help the desire from Merkel that people should use whatever vaccine is offered, but then when asked if she'll take it say nope as shes 6 months too old so presumably it suddenly becomes deadly to her as a 66 year old? Do they not realise how rediculous that position is when in a situation of urgently needing vaccinations to combat a disease which significantly impacts older age groups, but they are refusing to give it to older age groups because there were X thousand people over 65 in a trial rather than Y thousand.

Much like the arguments around if wearing a mask is a good idea or not, just wear the damned mask, it's not doing you any harm but might save someone else from getting sick.
Just take the damn vaccine, it's not doing you any harm but might save you from dying.

It's less than ideal situation for vaccine delivery, but that's where we are. There isn't anything to suggest a danger to people over 65, and there isn't anything to suggest a danger from having a 12 week gap in doses.

There comes a point once several million people have received the vaccine, despite it not being within a formal tial, that you just have to accept that there isn't a problem with the vaccine and get on with solving the problem of the virus by whatever means available.

Strazdas · 25-02-2021 11:33PM

AngeloArgue wrote: »

Both the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the European Medicine Agency (EMA) approve AstraZeneca for all ages and yet some individual countries decide to reject it outright.

It's the local health authorities / medicines agency in each country who make the decision as to who gets the vaccine. The government of those countries have no say.

astrofool · 25-02-2021 11:36PM

robinph wrote: »

Which is the bigger risk? Vaccinating people or having doses go unused? Does it help the desire from Merkel that people should use whatever vaccine is offered, but then when asked if she'll take it say nope as shes 6 months too old so presumably it suddenly becomes deadly to her as a 66 year old? Do they not realise how rediculous that position is when in a situation of urgently needing vaccinations to combat a disease which significantly impacts older age groups, but they are refusing to give it to older age groups because there were X thousand people over 65 in a trial rather than Y thousand.

Much like the arguments around if wearing a mask is a good idea or not, just wear the damned mask, it's not doing you any harm but might save someone else from getting sick.
Just take the damn vaccine, it's not doing you any harm but might save you from dying.

It's less than ideal situation for vaccine delivery, but that's where we are. There isn't anything to suggest a danger to people over 65, and there isn't anything to suggest a danger from having a 12 week gap in doses.

There comes a point once several million people have received the vaccine, despite it not being within a formal tial, that you just have to accept that there isn't a problem with the vaccine and get on with solving the problem of the virus by whatever means available.

Now moving onto a different argument, I completely agree, not using the AZ vaccines if you have them is stupid, luckily we're getting through them fairly swiftly. If you read the full story from Germany, it seems to be mostly a logistic issue now due to using AZ for a younger age profile which hadn't been planned to happen till later.

Switzerland not approving it is problematic (especially when it's the same lack of data that everybody else has been citing, they're also not in the EU and have no beef with the UK, removing the political aspect of it), will be interesting to see what the FDA does. It does seem that Oxford/AZ are doing their best at messing up every stage of what was a groundbreaking vaccine.

Pete_Cavan · 26-02-2021 06:44AM

AngeloArgue wrote: »

Both the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the European Medicine Agency (EMA) approve AstraZeneca for all ages and yet some individual countries decide to reject it outright.

Its not so much that it was rejected, its that they are not satisfied with the data provided for particular age groups. These decisions should be data led, assuming it to work despite the absence of data and then catch up with the data later after you have already ploughed on with it is the definition of taking a risk, even if the risk is low. Individual countries can decide where they set the bar as to what is an unacceptable risk.

If a newly developed treatment became available with very limited data on its effectiveness in children, would you be happy for your child to get it and assume they are protected despite lack of supporting data, or would you say give that to those for whom it has been proven to be effective and give my child the one that has been proven to be effective in children?

robinph · 26-02-2021 07:00AM

Pete_Cavan wrote: »

If a newly developed treatment became available with very limited data on its effectiveness in children, would you be happy for your child to get it and assume they are protected despite lack of supporting data, or would you say give that to those for whom it has been proven to be effective and give my child the one that has been proven to be effective in children?

Depends if the thing you are trying to prevent is largely affecting children or not.

At the moment there is a virus going around that mostly affects older people, but the vaccine is only being taken up by younger people in certain countries.

PCeeeee · 26-02-2021 07:05AM

AngeloArgue wrote: »

Both the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the European Medicine Agency (EMA) approve AstraZeneca for all ages and yet some individual countries decide to reject it outright.

The WHO don't give approval in the sense you mean.

Pete_Cavan · 26-02-2021 07:17AM

robinph wrote: »

Depends if the thing you are trying to prevent is largely affecting children or not.

At the moment there is a virus going around that mostly affects older people, but the vaccine is only being taken up by younger people in certain countries.

The child was just an analogy as people usually look at things differently if their child is affected.

You are right, the current virus mostly affects older people, hence wouldn't you agree it is better that older people get a vaccine which has full data to support it being effective for them. The vaccine with limited data on older people is not being given to them, instead going to younger people for whom there is supporting data. If dara becomes available to show it is effective in older people, policy can change in line with data. Pretty reasonable approach wouldn't you agree?

robinph · 26-02-2021 07:40AM

Pete_Cavan wrote: »

The child was just an analogy as people usually look at things differently if their child is affected.

You are right, the current virus mostly affects older people, hence wouldn't you agree it is better that older people get a vaccine which has full data to support it being effective for them. The vaccine with limited data on older people is not being given to them, instead going to younger people for whom there is supporting data. If dara becomes available to show it is effective in older people, policy can change in line with data. Pretty reasonable approach wouldn't you agree?

If you have the supply of different vaccines to do that with then yes.

If you don't have that supply and flexibility to chose then just get any jabs in the arm... Or don't complain when in X months time you still haven't got your population vaccinated and still have people dying and are in a state of lock down. There isn't anything to suggest that the vaccine is dangerous for older people,so if it's all you have available and the only potential way out of your current crisis then just use it.

Once you have the supply of multiple vaccines to choose who gets which one then do that. But right now they don't, and have low take up of vaccination in general when they are available. They should be prioritising getting people to take vaccines, not finding more excuses for them not to.

McGiver · 26-02-2021 07:53AM

PCeeeee wrote: »

The WHO don't give approval in the sense you mean.

Exactly, the WHO doesn't approve pharmaceuticals as the FDA or EMA do.

OscarMIlde · 26-02-2021 07:58AM

robinph wrote: »

On reading that my reading was drawn to the bit about people with autoimmune conditions, as that covers me, and they say that no testing was done but sure give it to them anyway because we've never seen anything previously to suggest there might be any issues even though nobody actually tested it.

Perfectly valid for them to say whack it into those peoples arms who we didn't test this one on them. But for some reason when all the historical data they have saying that there isn't likely any negative impact from doing a 12 week gap between doses it's suddenly the most dangerous thing ever done with a vaccine program.

It's outside of the trial data to have that gap, but it's also not covered for any trials for them to stick the vaccines in my arm. I'll be round there like a shot the moment they get round to calling me in though.

To be fair though I think there is a possible risk for people with autoimmune diseases (and I am one of those people), I think there is more of a risk of possible autoimmune responses from covid 19 itself, given that it leads to a sustained highly inflammatory response. I weighed it up and decided better the devil I don't know than the devil I do in this case.

Pete_Cavan · 26-02-2021 08:09AM

robinph wrote: »

If you have the supply of different vaccines to do that with then yes.

If you don't have that supply and flexibility to chose then just get any jabs in the arm... Or don't complain when in X months time you still haven't got your population vaccinated and still have people dying and are in a state of lock down. There isn't anything to suggest that the vaccine is dangerous for older people,so if it's all you have available and the only potential way out of your current crisis then just use it.

Once you have the supply of multiple vaccines to choose who gets which one then do that. But right now they don't, and have low take up of vaccination in general when they are available. They should be prioritising getting people to take vaccines, not finding more excuses for them not to.

There are sufficient supplies of vaccines with proven effectiveness in older people to vaccinate the older population. The AZ vaccine is then being given to younger people in parallel. The issue is a lack of supply of vaccines in general, but AZ in particular. There is enough mRNA vaccines at present to do people 70+, the other priority group is health care workers and they are younger so are getting the AZ vaccine. Giving AZ to older people achieves very little as it would just see HCWs getting mRNA, it doesn't increase the supply of vaccines. You are combining unrelated issues to suit your narrative.

I don't think anyone has suggested the AZ vaccine is dangerous. The reason many countries are not giving it to older people is because of a lack of data to support it being fully effective in older people. You arguing it is not dangerous ignores the actual reasons for the policy and argues something a point nobody has made. There is another issue that AZs vaccine is less effective against the SA variant and possibly other variants so people want the vaccine that looks to be effective against them. That is not saying that the AZ vaccine is dangerous. Again you are twisting things to suit yourself.

robinph · 26-02-2021 08:43AM

Pete_Cavan wrote: »

There are sufficient supplies of vaccines with proven effectiveness in older people to vaccinate the older population. The AZ vaccine is then being given to younger people in parallel. The issue is a lack of supply of vaccines in general, but AZ in particular. There is enough mRNA vaccines at present to do people 70+, the other priority group is health care workers and they are younger so are getting the AZ vaccine. Giving AZ to older people achieves very little as it would just see HCWs getting mRNA, it doesn't increase the supply of vaccines. You are combining unrelated issues to suit your narrative.

I don't think anyone has suggested the AZ vaccine is dangerous. The reason many countries are not giving it to older people is because of a lack of data to support it being fully effective in older people. You arguing it is not dangerous ignores the actual reasons for the policy and argues something a point nobody has made. There is another issue that AZs vaccine is less effective against the SA variant and possibly other variants so people want the vaccine that looks to be effective against them. That is not saying that the AZ vaccine is dangerous. Again you are twisting things to suit yourself.

I have no narrative or agenda, other than people should be taking whatever vacation option is offered to them.

If there are sufficient supplies though then not sure what the problem is, other than people bad mouthing a brand of vaccination for no good reason. The same reasoning applies for younger people taking whatever vaccines are available regardless of if it might work or not against some future mutation. Deal with today's problem today and take the vaccines. Worry about any mutation later on if it actually becomes an issue.

If your house is on fire you don't stop trying to put it out because your next door neighbour is smoking whilst stood next to a gas canister and might cause an explosion that will take you both out. Yes, get someone to go round and tell them to stop, (or get some other vaccines developed). But if you stop dealing with you house fire you'll still end up with a burnt down house.

Danzy · 26-02-2021 08:59AM

Germany alone has 1.4mn dosed of AZ that are just sitting there.

It's like the Eu doesn't want to end this crisis, not just bad planning and incompetence.

Germany looks like it is starting it's 3rd wave.

It's starting to verge in criminality at this stage.

is_that_so · 26-02-2021 09:03AM

Danzy wrote: »

Germany alone has 1.4mn dosed of AZ that are just sitting there.

It's like the Eu doesn't want to end this crisis, not just bad planning and incompetence.

Germany looks like it is starting it's 3rd wave.

It's starting to verge in criminality at this stage.

That's not the EU's fault, they have no control over what countries do with delivered vaccines. Germany has allowed the poor vaccine narrative about AZ to take hold and are entirely to blame for the situation.

Pete_Cavan · 26-02-2021 09:14AM

robinph wrote: »

I have no narrative or agenda, other than people should be taking whatever vacation option is offered to them.

If there are sufficient supplies though then not sure what the problem is, other than people bad mouthing a brand of vaccination for no good reason. The same reasoning applies for younger people taking whatever vaccines are available regardless of if it might work or not against some future mutation. Deal with today's problem today and take the vaccines. Worry about any mutation later on if it actually becomes an issue.

If your house is on fire you don't stop trying to put it out because your next door neighbour is smoking whilst stood next to a gas canister and might cause an explosion that will take you both out. Yes, get someone to go round and tell them to stop, (or get some other vaccines developed). But if you stop dealing with you house fire you'll still end up with a burnt down house.

I agree people should be taking whatever vaccine is offered to them.

There is a clear supply issue with all vaccines but AZ in particular. The supply of mRNA vaccines has been decent and they are being rolled out to older people who are the main priority group. The lack of supply of AZ vaccines is limiting roll out to younger groups. Giving AZ to older people doesn't increase the volume of vaccines and would make little difference to overall rollout. You are presenting the limiting of AZ to people under 65/70 as the issue with vaccine rollout, that is not the case, the problem is the limited number of older people in AZ trials and underperformance in producing vaccines.

robinph · 26-02-2021 09:31AM

Pete_Cavan wrote: »

... and underperformance in producing vaccines.

Yet there are unused vaccines sat around in bottles without arms to be put in. That is down to a combination of people being told it doesn't work for over 65s (which they then read as "it's dangerous") and it might not work for some mutation which isn't here yet, or isn't actually today's problem (which they then read as "it's dangerous").

In one of the articles quoted earlier Merkel was asked if she would take the AZ vaccine and she responded that she's too old (by 6 months). The correct response should have been "I'll take whichever I'm offered when my turn comes". Not just her fault that people are not taking the vaccines, but is one example of when a politician should be giving their standard response of avoid the question. All the noise around doesn't work for X age groups, won't work for Y mutation, Z country has been cheating us out of our supply and it all adds up to a big problem of people in countries that have a tendency to not take up vaccines as much as the UK and Ireland being given more reasons to say no.

is_that_so · 26-02-2021 09:38AM

robinph wrote: »

Yet there are unused vaccines sat around in bottles without arms to be put in. That is down to a combination of people being told it doesn't work for over 65s (which they then read as "it's dangerous") and it might not work for some mutation which isn't here yet, or isn't actually today's problem (which they then read as "it's dangerous").

In one of the articles quoted earlier Merkel was asked if she would take the AZ vaccine and she responded that she's too old (by 6 months). The correct response should have been "I'll take whichever I'm offered when my turn comes". Not just her fault that people are not taking the vaccines, but is one example of when a politician should be giving their standard response of avoid the question. All the noise around doesn't work for X age groups, won't work for Y mutation, Z country has been cheating us out of our supply and it all adds up to a big problem of people in countries that have a tendency to not take up vaccines as much as the UK and Ireland being given more reasons to say no.

No, that's how a German and a scientist to boot responds. They follow rules and instructions very well and don't take risks but others also share that opinion. It's based on the very small number of older participants in the trial, something Britain chose to ignore. That general approach on the over 65s may change as real world data emerges, but not for now.

robinph · 26-02-2021 09:53AM

is_that_so wrote: »

No, that's how a German and a scientist to boot responds. They follow rules and instructions very well and don't take risks but others also share that opinion. It's based on the very small number of older participants in the trial, something Britain chose to ignore. That general approach on the over 65s may change as real world data emerges, but not for now.

If they follow rules so well and the vaccine is approved for use in the people it's being offered too they why are so many not taking it?

is_that_so · 26-02-2021 09:58AM

robinph wrote: »

If they follow rules so well and the vaccine is approved for use in the people it's being offered too they why are so many not taking it?

Taking a vaccine is not mandatory nor rule-bound. That would be down to a bunch of German doctors refusing to do so thus setting a precedent. There have been some extremely contrary loud noises in Germany throughout this anyway.

robinph · 26-02-2021 10:06AM

is_that_so wrote: »

Taking a vaccine is not mandatory nor rule-bound. That would be down to a bunch of German doctors refusing to do so thus setting a precedent. There have been some extremely contrary loud noises in Germany throughout this anyway.

Exactly, so the government should be doing everything possible in order to encourage their population to take whichever vaccines are available. Not creating additional reasons for people to refuse it and thus prolong the pandemic.

is_that_so · 26-02-2021 10:08AM

robinph wrote: »

Exactly, so the government should be doing everything possible in order to encourage their population to take whichever vaccines are available. Not creating additional reasons for people to refuse it and thus prolong the pandemic.

Sure but that does not include going against their own decision on the over 65s and AZ. Apart from a childish strop by a few HCWs here we don't have that problem, people are taking whatever vaccine is coming their way.

robinph · 26-02-2021 10:23AM

is_that_so wrote: »

Sure but that does not include going against their own decision on the over 65s and AZ. Apart from a childish strop by a few HCWs here we don't have that problem, people are taking whatever vaccine is coming their way.

This chart shows a shocking waste of the available vaccines across significant population through Europe.

https://twitter.com/jburnmurdoch/status/1364963354176090113?s=20

Thankfully Ireland isn't subject to the vaccine fear.

is_that_so · 26-02-2021 10:28AM

robinph wrote: »

This chart shows a shocking waste of the available vaccines across significant population through Europe.

https://twitter.com/jburnmurdoch/status/1364963354176090113?s=20

Thankfully Ireland isn't subject to the vaccine fear.

There is a lot of vaccine hesitancy in some countries and a solid level of anti-vaxx as well. They have their work cut out for them. I reckon J&J saves the day for them, then they can quietly ship the AZ shots off to COVAX. As others have suggested the EU is now less likely to exercise a further option on AZ.

brickster69 · 26-02-2021 11:00AM

Unfortunately we will see the consequences of these actions in the next two or three months. Ireland and the UK got hit with this Kent variant early on, when there was no vaccines around and could not do much about it.

France now is up to 50% of cases with it, so they have the worst to come yet. Just a matter of time till gets about further to others quickly. Look at Spain everything is open and they think they will be swarmed with Tourists. Wait till that thing hit's them as we know what it does.

That window of time they had to give protection to the vulnerable will show what a huge cluster..ck it is. Two or three months time plenty of vaccines will be around but not that great when most people will of had it anyway and those vulnerable and not protected got the brunt of it.

This time they have now is critical.

brickster69 · 26-02-2021 11:08AM

Honestly it is like watching a car crash in slow motion. 75% of France's over 70's have not recieved 1 dose.

brickster69 · 26-02-2021 11:14AM

Look Czech Republic

https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/czechs-impose-tighter-lockdown-amid-uk-variant-surge-76131622?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

brickster69 · 26-02-2021 11:20AM

Belgium in a week

https://twitter.com/michelhenrion/status/1365245329998819328

26-02-2021 11:21AM

is_that_so wrote: »

There is a lot of vaccine hesitancy in some countries and a solid level of anti-vaxx as well. They have their work cut out for them. I reckon J&J saves the day for them, then they can quietly ship the AZ shots off to COVAX. As others have suggested the EU is now less likely to exercise a further option on AZ.

Doesn’t the J&J vaccine have a lower level of efficacy than AZ?

ninebeanrows · 26-02-2021 11:24AM

brickster69 wrote: »

Look Czech Republic

https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/czechs-impose-tighter-lockdown-amid-uk-variant-surge-76131622?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

It looks like a 3rd wave will hit some EU countries or is currently hitting them but we have to remember they never took a wave over Christmas like we did so a wave was predictable...the questions is how large it will be....Hopefully it will be tempered by rollout of vaccine..

Lockdowns in Europe have been nothing near like here, they have no country travel restrictions and people can meet in each-others homes......it's mainly just restaurants are closed with non essential stores closing around 6pm and post primary schools remote learning...

brickster69 · 26-02-2021 11:30AM

ninebeanrows wrote: »

so a wave was predictable.

That's what makes it all a clusterf..k. what's the saying "loose lips sink ships "

What exactly is happening with AstraZeneca?

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