1688

The 70% is probably averaging the two dose regimes.

This vaccine is easier to produce/store. My guess is this is what most people will get worldwide, and probably in the US to start as well.

1689

The US government is buying at least 100 million doses, of Pfizer and Moderna. There is also a deal with AstraZenca/Oxford but it is for slightly less money. I suspect American’s will get variety of vaccines.

The higher effectiveness of the mRNA vaccines and ease of manufacturing them I think would make it more those will be the primary vaccines.

1690

Another question I have long term: boosters for the vaccine (which I assume will be 2 years due to supply limitations first, then 1 yr if needed), would mixing the types of vaccine help? Would taking the first shot from one vaccine and the 2nd from another help?

There’s a lot of interesting ideas that might help improve the effectiveness of vaccines more that we’ll have to try out.

1691

I find the latest results a little puzzling, and wonder if they’ll hold up under larger numbers.

In the dosing plan that worked better, study participants were given a half-dose of the vaccine and then, a month later, a full dose. The vaccine was less effective when they were given a standard full dose upfront, followed a month later by another full dose.

I would have expected the opposite - that the two full dose regimen was the better result. Looking forward to seeing what immunologists think of that, and if there’s a mechanism that helps explain it.

1692

This vaccine is using a non-human adenovirus as a carrier. The risk, as I understand it, is that the human immune system ends up developing an immunity to the carrier virus which prevents the efficient delivery of the actual payload.

This risk is why they tested two different protocols. (There are other solutions, e.g. the Russians apparently were using different viruses as the carriers for the first and second shot.)

1693

Half doses weren’t the plan according to the company, so couldn’t be part of a planned protocol. This sounds more like a lucky fuckup.

Still waiting to hear what other differences there were in the two groups besides the unintended dosing difference. Population demographics, geography, etc.

“The reason we had the half dose is serendipity,” said Mene Pangalos, executive vice-president of biopharmaceuticals research and development at AstraZeneca.

When university researchers were distributing the vaccine at the end of April, around the start of Oxford and AstraZeneca’s partnership, they noticed expected side effects such as fatigue, headaches or arm aches were milder than expected.

“So we went back and checked … and we found out that they had underpredicted the dose of the vaccine by half,” said Pangalos.

Instead of restarting the trial, he said researchers decided to continue with the half dose and administer the full dose booster shot at the scheduled time.

1694

Russia claims 95% efficacy for their vaccine, too.

“Sputnik shows very high effectiveness, higher than 95%,” Kirill Dmitriev, the head of the Russian Direct Investment Fund, said during a briefing on Tuesday. “This is indisputably positive news not just for Russia, but for the entire world, for all countries.”

The preliminary results were released as competition heats up among vaccine developers to mass produce a coronavirus jab and help bring the pandemic to an end.

The Sputnik results were based on a study of 19,000 participants 42 days after receiving the first of two doses of the vaccine. Earlier data showed that the vaccine had an approximately 91.4% efficacy 28 days after particpants received the first dose.

1695

Yea right.

1696

But not for Putin. Seriously.

1697

Will Poland actually do anything to contain possible transfection risks like Denmark did? Seeing the fascist slant in their government, I doubt it.

1698

I thought this was discussed earlier, and they were talking about killing millions of minks due to it. Am I mixing my countries?

1699

Possibly. The original cull was in Denmark. Now it seems to be spreading to other countries.

1700

To put it eloquently, oh shit.

1701

Yeah, it was Denmark before. Specifically Jutland regions.

1702

After this last election, I just don’t have any faith in the Poles.

1703

>.<

1704

Why are you pun-ishing us?

1705

I heard Denmark is developing a highly effective anti-COVID oint-mink.

1706

Apparently the half dose regimen didn’t include any people over 55, which seems like the worst possible demographic bias they could end up with:

On a call with reporters, he suggested that the participants who received the half-strength initial dose had been 55 years old or younger.

1707

I believe this only occurred in Brazil as well. Lots of interesting potential confounders. The plan forward should be to pretty much throw out the double full dose data and get properly powered data on one protocol. None of this averaging bullshit.