What exactly is happening with AstraZeneca?

robinph · 17-04-2021 06:23PM

McGiver wrote: »

AZ is a third league player and failed to deliver even 120M doses to the EU. No way it can deliver vaccines for a significant % of world population. EU is pulling out of the contract and FDA won't approve it, that's game over in pharma terms.

They may struggle to manufacture, getting it to people in remote locations and into their arms is significantly easier if you just need a cool bag a nurse a needle and a land rover.

For Pfizer you need a minus 70 degrees freezer, and they don't exist anywhere near most people.

McGiver · 17-04-2021 06:37PM

robinph wrote: »

They may struggle to manufacture, getting it to people in remote locations and into their arms is significantly easier if you just need a cool bag a nurse a needle and a land rover.

For Pfizer you need a minus 70 degrees freezer, and they don't exist anywhere near most people.

Reply to that edge case is JJ. Single dose, largest pharma company, great logistics. Tough competition for AZ.

Apart from that, most world population lives in high density population clusters with advanced infrastructure or close to airport hubs so who cares about freezing.

As I said, Pfizer and Moderna alone will deliver 3.5 billion doses this year only. AZ has order of magnitude lower capability.

What's your point exactly? It's "British" hence it's the best? Despite all available evidence?

robinph · 17-04-2021 06:42PM

McGiver wrote: »

What's your point exactly? It's "British" hence it's the best? Despite all available evidence?

Most of the worlds population will get the cheaper and easier to distribute vaccine than the expensive and difficult to distribute one. If that is Astra Zeneca or Johnson & Johnson doesn't make much difference as they are essentially both the same, well except for Astra Zeneca still being way cheaper. They are both significantly easier to deliver to arms.

17-04-2021 06:50PM

McGiver wrote: »

Reply to that edge case is JJ. Single dose, largest pharma company, great logistics. Tough competition for AZ.

Apart from that, most world population lives in high density population clusters with advanced infrastructure or close to airport hubs so who cares about freezing.

As I said, Pfizer and Moderna alone will deliver 3.5 billion doses this year only. AZ has order of magnitude lower capability.

What's your point exactly? It's "British" hence it's the best? Despite all available evidence?

I think you should setup a pfzier/moderna thread. You clearly love all things mrna to the exclusion of all else.

Why do you post in here if you dislike AZ so much?

Have you anything positive to say about AZ?

Stark · 17-04-2021 06:54PM

Deleted User wrote: »

I think you should setup a pfzier/moderna thread. You clearly love all things mrna to the exclusion of all else.

Why do you post in here if you dislike AZ so much?

Have you anything positive to say about AZ?

J&J isn't mRNA.

josip · 17-04-2021 07:11PM

robinph wrote: »

They may struggle to manufacture, getting it to people in remote locations and into their arms is significantly easier if you just need a cool bag a nurse a needle and a land rover.

For Pfizer you need a minus 70 degrees freezer, and they don't exist anywhere near most people.

Not any more.
In February, Pfizer submitted data to the FDA showing that -15C to -25C was adequate.

robinph · 17-04-2021 07:23PM

josip wrote: »

Not any more.
In February, Pfizer submitted data to the FDA showing that -15C to -25C was adequate.

And what about the price, are they doing any work on finding ways to reduce that block on most of the planet making use of their vaccine.

Had heard they had been working on different temperatures for storage, so not unexpected. Sure I saw some article early on before any of them were approved which mentioned that the minus 70 was just the normal temperature for all vaccine trials, then they would do the same thing at minus twenty, then try for regular fridge. And also running multiple trials with different doses and multiple doses.
Would be nice to think that there was some planning between the manufacturers such that one just ran the minus 70 trial, the other went straight for minus twenty, another going for single dose and another straight for double doses. It just happened that they all worked, but the spread betting between manufacturers to more quickly find the answer is great and increased our chances of at least one working.

We got lucky that they all work, just now it's become a competition between them all rather than a collaboration.

astrofool · 17-04-2021 08:31PM

robinph wrote: »

And what about the price, are they doing any work on finding ways to reduce that block on most of the planet making use of their vaccine.

Had heard they had been working on different temperatures for storage, so not unexpected. Sure I saw some article early on before any of them were approved which mentioned that the minus 70 was just the normal temperature for all vaccine trials, then they would do the same thing at minus twenty, then try for regular fridge. And also running multiple trials with different doses and multiple doses.
Would be nice to think that there was some planning between the manufacturers such that one just ran the minus 70 trial, the other went straight for minus twenty, another going for single dose and another straight for double doses. It just happened that they all worked, but the spread betting between manufacturers to more quickly find the answer is great and increased our chances of at least one working.

We got lucky that they all work, just now it's become a competition between them all rather than a collaboration.

They're charging the developed nations most than developing nations depending on their ability to pay, so effectively the EU and States is subsidising the cost for other nations, few similar articles about it like this:
https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/pfizer-defends-high-cost-of-covid-vaccine-2414702

I'd imagine the next breakthrough will be fridge temperature for mRNA, but the fact it can now be done at refrigerator temperature makes it available to most of the world.

brickster69 wrote: »

It does make you wonder on the peculiar goings on with AZ. Probably just a coincidence how any mistrust came about really.

A lot has really been their own doing with the initial trials being a complete mess (and had to be entirely re-run in the USA, and then having the reporting debacle after the second trials which most clinicians were astonished at as it never happened before).

Coupled that with the actual issues with the vaccine, you can see the different in responses from a more able company vs. a newcomer, J&J immediately paused and halted rollout and started their investigation, as far as I know, AstraZeneca have barely acknowledged there's even an issue.

Initially it was a whole UK vs. EU thing that people thought bias was in play, but now lots of non EU nations have been following suit.

Enzokk · 17-04-2021 08:59PM

Deleted User wrote: »

:rolleyes: getting personal.

You should be careful yourself when predicting AZs demise in europe days after arguably the most powerful politician in europe was enoculated with it (Angela Merckle). Im putting you on ignore. You resort too easily to bash the poster than the post.

Not getting personal, but to be honest someone that may be deliberately changing what I posted about to suit their own needs on a discussion thread will get a short reply from me. Either you misread the post, in which case you apologise for a genuine mistake and move on, or you did it deliberately and you know what you were doing and is now again trying to move the discussion to something else.

I don't know what Merkle getting the AZ vaccine has to do with future AZ purchases within the EU. Maybe you can enlighten me how those two connect as I cannot see it.

Edit: See that you put me on ignore. I was actually looking forward to finding out an answer to my question. Guess that is my loss though.

robinph wrote: »

And what about the price, are they doing any work on finding ways to reduce that block on most of the planet making use of their vaccine.

Here is a confirmation that Pfizer is also not looking to make a profit from those that cannot afford it,

Virus variant detected in India has double mutation

The head of Pfizer has said that people will "likely" need a third dose of the company's Covid-19 shot within six to 12 months of vaccination.

CEO Albert Bourla also said annual vaccinations against the coronavirus may well be required.

...

Mr Bourla did not confirm the price of the Pfizer vaccine but admitted that it was sold at a higher price to developed countries like those in the EU or the United States.

"In middle-income countries, we sell it for half the price," he said. "In poorer countries, including in Africa, we sell it at cost."

fly_agaric · 18-04-2021 03:04PM

McGiver wrote: »

Yes and to compare...

Moderna alone has 18.4 billion APAs just for 2021. That's a billion doses minimum.

https://investors.modernatx.com/news-releases/news-release-details/moderna-reports-fourth-quarter-and-fiscal-year-2020-financial

Pfizer Biontech is aiming for 2.4 billion doses by the end of 2021.

https://investors.biontech.de/news-releases/news-release-details/biontech-announces-full-year-2020-financial-results-and

As it stands these two companies will be vaccinating most of the world. The rest could be JJ as and where applicable. Before Curevac kicks in.

mRNA is the way to go forward and both the US and the EU have recognised this.

AZ is a third league player and failed to deliver even 120M doses to the EU. No way it can deliver vaccines for a significant % of world population. EU is pulling out of the contract and FDA won't approve it, that's game over in pharma terms.

Assume that is 1.8 billion for Moderna? edit - sorry just scanned it and see that was a currency amount ($18.4 bn).

Yes even if harder to store and distribute they'll be very important once the US starts to allow export of them, given it can produce such extremely large quantities.

There is alot of AZs vaccine being made in India (I would not expect AZ themselves would have much to do with that on the ground (?) after it has started and is up and running).

I've read about production of it being licenced for other places too like Australia, but it is never going to be an important vaccine for the US or the EU and I don't think it will be as quite as key to relief from the pandemic in the rest of the world as people originally expected.

18-04-2021 05:15PM

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.news-medical.net/amp/news/20210416/Single-dose-of-Oxforde28093AstraZeneca-COVID-vaccine-shown-to-be-more-immunogenic-than-natural-infection.aspx

Interesting piece.

McGiver · 18-04-2021 08:33PM

[Deleted User] wrote: »

I think you should setup a pfzier/moderna thread. You clearly love all things mrna to the exclusion of all else.

Why do you post in here if you dislike AZ so much?

Have you anything positive to say about AZ?

Reply my questions instead of asking your own.

McGiver · 18-04-2021 09:03PM

fly_agaric wrote: »

There is alot of AZs vaccine being made in India (I would not expect AZ themselves would have much to do with that on the ground (?) after it has started and is up and running).

I've read about production of it being licenced for other places too like Australia, but it is never going to be an important vaccine for the US or the EU and I don't think it will be as quite as key to relief from the pandemic in the rest of the world as people originally expected.

Australia is tiny market.

I can't see how AZ could deliver significant quantities fast enough (100s of millions of doses this year/early 2022) worldwide.

The mRNA tech is really taking hold and countries which will be able to afford it will pay for it. It's much safer, more efficacious and faster to adjust and deploy (variant boosters). It's actually incredible leap forward in terms of immunology and biotechnology.
Just look at the Moderna's trials and vaccine pipeline:
EBV, HPV, HIV, CMV, RSV, Zika, Nipah, Chikungunya, various tumours, personalised cancer vaccine, rare metabolic diseases (phenylketonuria), autoimmune diseases, regenerative therapeutics...

The Covid mRNA vaccine research and deployment accelerated this area by years.

Now, compare with the Oxford-AZ. Yes, it's a vaccine that works. But it's of inferior technology, inferior safety, inferior efficacy and unfortunately the company manufacturing it is now a completely discredited company. No way this company can supply large % of the world vaccines if it can't fulfill its largest contract with the EU of 300M doses by the end of Q2. Only 100M will be delivered, if even that. That's just poor.

murphaph · 19-04-2021 08:37AM

I think the writing is on the wall for the old fashioned vaccines based on inactive virus. mRNA is the new kid on the block and already the future. We may actually be able to save many more lives in the future thanks to the covid 19 crisis, not that this makes a difference to the families of those lost.

There's no way AZ or J&J can react quickly enough to the variants and that's what we're going to need.

goingnowhere · 19-04-2021 08:44AM

astrofool wrote: »

I'd imagine the next breakthrough will be fridge temperature for mRNA, but the fact it can now be done at refrigerator temperature makes it available to most of the world.

Its called Curvac and hopefully will submit for approval shortly.

fly_agaric · 19-04-2021 11:36AM

McGiver wrote: »

The mRNA tech is really taking hold and countries which will be able to afford it will pay for it.

Think it may go wider than that.

The current US admin. has the more traditional US approach to geopolitics and alliances as opposed to Trump and will want to supply others that need it (I'd expect subsidising them as regards cost where required).

However, from what I've read, aside from any domestic political optics (Republicans attacking them for "giving away Americas vaccines" etc to ingrates like Mexico, Canada or Central/South American countries) it is almost impossible for them to unwind what Trump has done with Operation warp speed.

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2021/04/why-the-us-still-cant-donate-covid-19-vaccines-to-countries-in-need

robinph · 19-04-2021 12:20PM

murphaph wrote: »

I think the writing is on the wall for the old fashioned vaccines based on inactive virus. mRNA is the new kid on the block and already the future. We may actually be able to save many more lives in the future thanks to the covid 19 crisis, not that this makes a difference to the families of those lost.

There's no way AZ or J&J can react quickly enough to the variants and that's what we're going to need.

Human trials with the Oxford vaccine started in April 2020. The dna of the virus was made available in January and I believe they had the vaccine figured out within days, the delay before the trials was in getting money.

Not exactly slow.

goingnowhere · 19-04-2021 01:06PM

mRNA is just mRNA

You just code it to the need and run

So the production process and flow remains the same, this is huge

robinph · 19-04-2021 01:18PM

I don't think the development time for any of the vaccine types is going to be an issue. For example the current Indian variant they are potentially concerned about, but not yet as it's still not clear if its going to be of any concern, was first identified back in October/ November. Plenty of time for any of the vaccines to create new variations as needed.

I know there is a great desire to beat up Astra Zeneca round here because they stole vaccine shipments from the EU and called the EU names across the playground, but the speed to developing new vaccine variations isn't a good reason to declare it defunct. Various other business reasons to not be too keen on it, but nothing wrong with the science.

19-04-2021 01:33PM

robinph wrote: »

Human trials with the Oxford vaccine started in April 2020. The dna of the virus was made available in January and I believe they had the vaccine figured out within days, the delay before the trials was in getting money.

Not exactly slow.

The "slowness" aspect is the time it takes to grow your viral vector, it's about 3 months to get enough ready for a batch. Complicated process too.

robinph · 19-04-2021 04:16PM

[Deleted User] wrote: »

The "slowness" aspect is the time it takes to grow your viral vector, it's about 3 months to get enough ready for a batch. Complicated process too.

... And the variants currently being considered as of concern were identified 6 months ago. If it turns out that new versions are required each year then any of the current vaccines can be used. Remember it was only a year ago that trials were begun and we've been using a multitude of different vaccines for nearly 5 months already.

The vaccines all combine to give us a lot of options.

deeperlearning · 20-04-2021 10:24PM

This article outlines why mRNA vaccines are the way forward.

https://theconversation.com/3-doses-then-1-each-year-why-pfizer-not-astrazeneca-is-the-best-bet-for-the-long-haul-159137

The advantage of mRNA vaccines like Pfizer’s is they’re much easier to update than the “viral vector” vaccines like AstraZeneca’s. An updated vaccine is produced more quickly.

Another issues is what immunologists call “vector immunity”. You can’t be repeatedly immunised with a viral vector vaccine because you’ll likely develop immunity to the adenovirus vector (the delivery vehicle) itself.

robinph · 21-04-2021 06:26AM

deeperlearning wrote: »

This article outlines why mRNA vaccines are the way forward.

https://theconversation.com/3-doses-then-1-each-year-why-pfizer-not-astrazeneca-is-the-best-bet-for-the-long-haul-159137

The advantage of mRNA vaccines like Pfizer’s is they’re much easier to update than the “viral vector” vaccines like AstraZeneca’s. An updated vaccine is produced more quickly.

Another issues is what immunologists call “vector immunity”. You can’t be repeatedly immunised with a viral vector vaccine because you’ll likely develop immunity to the adenovirus vector (the delivery vehicle) itself.

The flu vaccine called and would like to query the source of those claims seeing as there are new versions created every 6 months and it isn't based on mRNA.

OscarMIlde · 21-04-2021 06:44AM

robinph wrote: »

The flu vaccine called and would like to query the source of those claims seeing as there are new versions created every 6 months and it isn't based on mRNA.

With the viral vector based vaccines though you get a lot of off-target effects due to the immune system recognising the vector itself as a foreign entity and raising an immune response against the vector as well as the inserted antigen target (in the case of Covid 19 this is the spike protein). In the case of the adenoviral vectors this seems to cause serious inflammatory clotting in a small cohort of people, hence the deaths/serious adverse effects associated with both Astra Zenecka and Johnson&Johnson vaccines.

Not only that, but any future viral vector based vaccines would need a completely different viral backbone as there would likely exist pre-existing immunity against previously used vectors amongst vaccinated people. This would entail another rigorous round of safety/efficacy trials to ensure the next vector is safe and suitable. This is on top of the cost/effort of identifying or creating these new vectors.

With the mRNA based vaccines the lipid coating itself seems safe for the most part, so the only varying immune response will be from altering the protein encoded by the mRNA particles. The immune response generated will be much 'cleaner' as the only antigenic portion of these vaccines is the varying protein antigen and safety issues should be minimised as the underlying technology has few risks. Hence much more suitable for diversified targets and scaleable production.

robinph · 21-04-2021 07:44AM

And how does the flu vaccine manage to work, kind of, with new variations every 6 months.

It's great that the mRNA versions are able to be re done so quickly. But that doesn't mean we've suddenly become incapable of doing what has been done using flu vaccines for the last couple of decades.

Stark · 21-04-2021 08:34AM

We don't have viral vector vaccines for the flu. Viral vector technology is almost as new as mRNA.

Skygord · 21-04-2021 08:42AM

AstraZeneca "Delivery scheduled for April 24th has been reduced from 45,000 doses to 9,000 doses"

https://www.irishmirror.ie/news/irish-news/more-astrazeneca-vaccine-delays-ireland-23949585

https://www.thejournal.ie/astrazeneca-delivery-5415690-Apr2021/

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/state-to-receive-just-9-000-doses-of-astrazeneca-vaccine-until-may-1.4542795

robinph · 21-04-2021 09:04AM

Stark wrote: »

Viral vector technology is almost as new as mRNA.

I'm seeing mentions of them being in development/ use since the '70's?

Stark · 21-04-2021 09:42AM

That doesn't mean they've been used for flu vaccines (outside of trials) though. RNA vaccine development goes back to the 90s but Covid has been the catalyst for using both technologies widescale. Ebola is the only other virus where viral vector vaccines are used outside trials afaik.

robinph · 21-04-2021 09:56AM

Which just means that a statement from the boss of one company about the product from a couple of other companies and using lots of mights and maybes and coulds and don't knows to cover themselves should be taken with large grains of salt.

It's no more known what vaccines we'll be using next year, or the year after, or who, how many and in what categories we'll need to give them, than it is known what new variant will emerge next week from Timbuktu that will cause the next thing for headline writers to get worried about.

What exactly is happening with AstraZeneca?

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