Are vaccines the light at the end of the tunnel?

[D C]

5 hours ago, zanderblue said:

Any of our experts able to comment on this information? I’m thinking the reduced transmission claim is positive.

Interesting. So positive PCR tests among the vaccinated are their surrogate for transmissibility. Assumption being that if it's detected by pcr, then one must be contagious (which we know isn't true). It's not clear what the baseline is for the 67% reduction though.  Very encouraging despite being an initial release of info!

[4774Papa]

Almost 33 million doses administered in the USA.

https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#vaccinations

[D C]

28 minutes ago, 4774Papa said:

Almost 33 million doses administered in the USA.

https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#vaccinations

26 million individuals having received at least 1 shot.   Progress.  Sure hope the rate can ramp up a bit. 

 

I wonder how much higher the actual/unreported totals are.  Surely there is a significant delay in the CDC compiling the numbers.

Edited February 3, 2021 by D C

[wrk2cruise]

18 hours ago, Ken the cruiser said:

This should be interesting - Federal government to ship Covid vaccines to retail pharmacies next week (nbcnews.com)

 

I heard this during a news conference with our NC HHS secretary yesterday.  I found it interesting as our state seems like it has figured out how to distribute as for the last 2 weeks they have been able to get pretty much 100% of available doses administered each week with almost 300,000 one week.  

 

The program being run by Walgreens and CVS for Long term care seems to be way behind although I'm happy my 92 year old MIL in memory care has had 2 doses of Moderna.  From the charts you can see they are holding back second doses here which I think is good as it seems everyone is getting an appointment for second dose when receiving the first.

 

It seems to me that dividing up the allocations between the state health department, Long Term Care program and now retail pharmacy will make it even harder on citizens to locate available doses.

 

[TeeRick]

18 hours ago, nocl said:

This approach is interesting since it may avoid the potential for the patient developing an immune response to the vector impacting the efficacy of the second and follow on booster doses.

Yes that is the primary reason they used this approach.

[4774Papa]

20 minutes ago, D C said:

26 million individuals having received at least 1 shot.   Progress.  Sure hope the rate can ramp up a bit. 

 

I wonder how much higher the actual/unreported totals are.  Surely there is a significant delay in the CDC compiling the numbers.

The USA is now administering 1.32 million doses per day.  At that rate by June about 160 more doses would have been administered for a total of 193 million doses.  Children aren't being vaccinated and they account for 22% of US population.  I read recently that now only about 25% of people don't want the vaccine.  The don't want group may get smaller the more people are vaccinated.  

[TeeRick]

Here is the link to the AstraZeneca/Oxford preprint publication in Lancet.  Overall good news. Including vaccine efficacy after two standard doses at 82.4% with a 3 month interval between doses as being practiced in the UK.  And interesting 67% reduction of transmission data too.

 

This data was a blended  country study using subjects from the UK, S.Africa and Brazil.  So it includes all major variants.  To me this is great news to have over 80% efficacy.  Keep in mind that if the mRNA vaccines were studied in these populations in this later time frame their efficacy might not have come in at 95%.  But all vaccines are highly effective reducing severe COVID and deaths.

 

 If this vaccine cuts transmissions then I would also believe that the mRNA vaccines and the J&J vaccines do as well.  Moderna has already reported preliminary evidence earlier.  The problem is that a truly careful and detailed study needs to be done to support these preliminary analysis.  But the bottom line no matter is that once these vaccines are in enough people will the virus spread be significantly slowed or stopped? That is what counts.

 

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3777268

 

Also from Oxford University a short summary.

https://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2021-02-02-oxford-coronavirus-vaccine-shows-sustained-protection-76-during-3-month-interval#

Edited February 3, 2021 by TeeRick

[D C]

1 hour ago, 4774Papa said:

The USA is now administering 1.32 million doses per day.  At that rate by June about 160 more doses would have been administered for a total of 193 million doses.  Children aren't being vaccinated and they account for 22% of US population.  I read recently that now only about 25% of people don't want the vaccine.  The don't want group may get smaller the more people are vaccinated.  

Interesting and coincidental math...

330 million people x 78% adults x 75% acceptance rate = 193 million  🙂

[deadzone1003]

2 hours ago, 4774Papa said:

The USA is now administering 1.32 million doses per day.  At that rate by June about 160 more doses would have been administered for a total of 193 million doses.  Children aren't being vaccinated and they account for 22% of US population.  I read recently that now only about 25% of people don't want the vaccine.  The don't want group may get smaller the more people are vaccinated.  

Even at that rate, many states are close to running out of vaccines.  I expect those that are over 80% of vaccines administered are close to running out.  The 1.32 million doses per day are the mRNA vaccines.  If J&J is given an EUA this month (which is a given), they reportedly will have 12 million doses by the end of this month to pass out.  Their contract to the USA is 100,000,000 doses which is due (if it is the same as the mRNA vaccines) 90 days after the approval or EUA.  Once J&J is available, the USA can use all of the current network for the flu vaccines, from pharmacies to Doctor's office.  What I can't find out is if the children's vaccines are part of each companies vaccine count.  If they are separate, we may have a flood of vaccines by the end of May, given that Moderna has pledge to move its delivery deadline from July 1st to June 1st for its 2nd 100,000,000 dose contract.  We should be able to fully vaccinate the adult population by the end of May, if they are willing.  I suspect we may be able to fully vaccinate the adult population that is willing to be vaccinate by the end of April.  My wife and I are willing to be vaccinated, but we like a little history before actually doing it.  So, we are expecting to be vaccinated in late Aug or early Sep.  So far, the only negative news about the J&J vaccine is the lower than expected efficacy.  The question may be will Americans be willing to take the J&J vaccine or will they insist on a mRNA vaccine?

[larry_s_taco]

Just got our vaccine appointments for Saturday. We are in the 65 & over group in Indiana. Can't wait to get it!

[TeeRick]

1 hour ago, deadzone1003 said:

So far, the only negative news about the J&J vaccine is the lower than expected efficacy.  The question may be will Americans be willing to take the J&J vaccine or will they insist on a mRNA vaccine?

Lower than expected efficacy as compared to the two mRNA vaccines? A few months ago everybody was hoping for 60% for any COVID vaccine.  I would take the J&J vaccine today if it was offered to me.  The different clinical studies were done at different times and in different countries and against different variants.  J&J and AZ have data from S.Africa for example.  The mRNA vaccines do not. The efficacy of J&J and AZ vaccines compared to the mRNA vaccines means what ?? Nothing negative at all in the real world scenario.  All four vaccines are effective at 100% in eliminating severe COVID and hospitalizations and death.  So is Novavax.  Without serious side effects.  That is the simple truth of which everybody needs to be educated.  

 

The difference in apparent efficacy means that I might be in the 5% group with mild symptoms after the Pfizer vaccine.  But I might be in the 20% group with mild symptoms after the J&J vaccine. 

[deadzone1003]

Many people are going to look at the mRNA's 95% and J&J's 66% and think mRNA's is better.  Actually, when you look at the data, it looks worst.  95% means for every 20 people in the Placebo group got covid19, 1 person in the vaccinated group got covid19, assuming both groups are equal size.  66% means for every 3 people in the Placebo group got covid19, 1 person in the vaccinated group got covid19.  If there were 3 equal size groups in a trial, for every 60 people in the placebo group who got sick with covid19, 20 would be sick in the J&J group, while 3 would be sick in the mRNA group.  However, the J&J would be ideal for those who don't think they need it, but are required to have it.  One last thing that is up in the air.  What is required for herd immunity?  Problem is as the R0 factor goes up, so do the % of herd immunity.  Originally, when they said the R0 was 2.6 in the original variant (or in their neighborhod), herd immunity of 60-70% was needed.  I'm hearing R0 factor of 5+ for some of the lastest variants - the required herd immunity is well over 80% - maybe room for anti-vaxxers or people who are allergic or who are too frail.

[nocl]

10 hours ago, D C said:

Interesting. So positive PCR tests among the vaccinated are their surrogate for transmissibility. Assumption being that if it's detected by pcr, then one must be contagious (which we know isn't true). It's not clear what the baseline is for the 67% reduction though.  Very encouraging despite being an initial release of info!

They should do at least two different tests to confirm infection for someone vaccinated.  PCR has a false positive rate of around .4% to .6%.  A pretty low number if you are dealing with an fairly high infection rate (with Covid it has much higher false negative rate ) so it needs to be combined with clinical observations for a negative result and lacking clinical symptoms a different test of a different type in someone vaccinated (relatively low infection rate).  Otherwise we are going to be dealing with ongoing news stories of positives among vaccinated that might be over blown with  a number of false positives.

 

Considerably worse with antigen tests without follow up with an alternative test.

[nocl]

4 hours ago, TeeRick said:

Lower than expected efficacy as compared to the two mRNA vaccines? A few months ago everybody was hoping for 60% for any COVID vaccine.  I would take the J&J vaccine today if it was offered to me.  The different clinical studies were done at different times and in different countries and against different variants.  J&J and AZ have data from S.Africa for example.  The mRNA vaccines do not. The efficacy of J&J and AZ vaccines compared to the mRNA vaccines means what ?? Nothing negative at all in the real world scenario.  All four vaccines are effective at 100% in eliminating severe COVID and hospitalizations and death.  So is Novavax.  Without serious side effects.  That is the simple truth of which everybody needs to be educated.  

 

The difference in apparent efficacy means that I might be in the 5% group with mild symptoms after the Pfizer vaccine.  But I might be in the 20% group with mild symptoms after the J&J vaccine. 

However removing the data from the variant areas the J&J data is still worse.  They did include a subset in the data that was the efficacy against the original variant.

 

None of the vaccines have looked at the question of  negative impacts of COVID that occur even in mild cases.  Including long haul, neurological, cardio, etc.  Have not see a single study looking at those questions for the vaccines.  If they can show that the vaccines protect against those impacts, then I would be less concerned about overall efficacy.  

 

They also need to deal with the infection vs symptomatic illness as well.  They could easily do that by running some trials looking at vaccinated individuals.  It would need to be a university or government study because there is no benefit to the pharmaceuticals companies themselves to look at such data.

 

I would take the J&J vaccine but not the AZ, due to the single dose.  Largely because I expect that there will be follow on boosters available to deal with some of the variants 6 months or so from now.

Edited February 3, 2021 by nocl

[TeeRick]

Everybody let's not make this so complicated and confusing. 

Speaking for myself only, in simplest terms possible, I would take any of these vaccines if offered to me.  In the small chance that I do get a COVID infection after vaccination and have symptoms, I will not have serious disease and I will not die of COVID.  I have the same thought every year when I get my Flu vaccine.  If I  contract influenza,  the vaccine will likely keep me from being hospitalized with it.  Good enough for me.  If I need to get an annual COVID vaccine with my Flu vaccine, that is not a problem.  Either way I will hopefully be cruising and traveling.

[malony33]

By the time cruise lines that depart out of U.S. ports again, won't proof of vaccine inoculation be a requirement to sail? And if this is so, will masks and social distancing still be mandatory?

 

Does anyone know if any lines have made a statement about this?

 

I hope all who are reading this are well.

 

[D C]

3 hours ago, TeeRick said:

Everybody let's not make this so complicated and confusing. 

Speaking for myself only, in simplest terms possible, I would take any of these vaccines if offered to me.  In the small chance that I do get a COVID infection after vaccination and have symptoms, I will not have serious disease and I will not die of COVID.  I have the same thought every year when I get my Flu vaccine.  If I  contract influenza,  the vaccine will likely keep me from being hospitalized with it.  Good enough for me.  If I need to get an annual COVID vaccine with my Flu vaccine, that is not a problem.  Either way I will hopefully be cruising and traveling.

EXACTLY! 

Get ANY of the vaccines and you won't end up in the hospital or dead (at least not from covid).  I thought that was the goal all along. 

 

Plus, even if you weren't destined for the hospital, you'll only get a little sick. 

 

Close to half of the population gets a sometimes-good, sometimes-merely-ok influenza vaccine every year. Why? Because they're afraid that the flu will kill them, or because they'd rather not be down and out in misery for a week if they get it?  Personally, I'm totally in the latter group,as I expect most people are.  Why should a damn-good covid vaccine be any different? 

[shiphound]

My wife and I got the first dose of Pfizer vaccine last week.  Cannot wait to get second dose. 

[nocl]

4 hours ago, TeeRick said:

Everybody let's not make this so complicated and confusing. 

Speaking for myself only, in simplest terms possible, I would take any of these vaccines if offered to me.  In the small chance that I do get a COVID infection after vaccination and have symptoms, I will not have serious disease and I will not die of COVID.  I have the same thought every year when I get my Flu vaccine.  If I  contract influenza,  the vaccine will likely keep me from being hospitalized with it.  Good enough for me.  If I need to get an annual COVID vaccine with my Flu vaccine, that is not a problem.  Either way I will hopefully be cruising and traveling.

Is any vaccine better than no vaccine - that is pretty clear

 

But the data does show a lower efficacy for the J&J vaccine when it comes to symptomatic illness, with a number of questions on all of the vaccines still unanswered.

[Porky55]

Question:

scenario: here in Aus, because our numbers are sooooo low, a Positive test has State leaders on their toes, closing businesses, schools, mandating masks, stopping funerals and weddings and on it goes.

 

But …… my question is about a single super infectious UK strain positive test (quarantine worker in WA) but ‘no one’ in his close circle testing positive - yet ( 5/6 days app)  Usually at least a few cases by now.
The state Chief Health Officer says - perhaps this person IS NOT  a Super shedder Versus a “Super Shedder” !!

 

Can you please explain this latest piece of weird science - ‘does shed lots or doesn’t shed lots’ - of what? - Saliva? Virus cells? Dandruff? 

Thanks in anticipation  🤔🙄

Edited February 4, 2021 by Porky55

[cruise47]

Have anyone heard about a New Vaccine Passport being developed in Denmark.

This passport will show that you have been vaccinated for  COVID-19 (dates and the type of vaccine).

[Nancycat]

12 hours ago, malony33 said:

By the time cruise lines that depart out of U.S. ports again, won't proof of vaccine inoculation be a requirement to sail? And if this is so, will masks and social distancing still be mandatory?

 

Does anyone know if any lines have made a statement about this?

 

I hope all who are reading this are well.

 

Vaccines are wonderful, but at this time there is no definitive evidence that the vaccines prevent transmission of Covid.

Wearing a mask protects others, 

I will be fully vaccinated in less than a week and will continue to wear a mask to protect those who are not.

[TeeRick]

5 hours ago, Porky55 said:

Question:

scenario: here in Aus, because our numbers are sooooo low, a Positive test has State leaders on their toes, closing businesses, schools, mandating masks, stopping funerals and weddings and on it goes.

 

But …… my question is about a single super infectious UK strain positive test (quarantine worker in WA) but ‘no one’ in his close circle testing positive - yet ( 5/6 days app)  Usually at least a few cases by now.
The state Chief Health Officer says - perhaps this person IS NOT  a Super shedder Versus a “Super Shedder” !!

 

Can you please explain this latest piece of weird science - ‘does shed lots or doesn’t shed lots’ - of what? - Saliva? Virus cells? Dandruff? 

Thanks in anticipation  🤔🙄

First off, Australia is mostly isolated and has done a great job overall of keeping the virus out or at great containment when it does pop up.  Your leaders are being very careful and rightly so.  Keep the beast at bay.

 

Shedding is a term in viral diseases meaning "release of active, infectious viral particles" and in the case of COVID (SARS-CoV-2) release of these infectious virus particles on respiratory droplets from your mouth and nose into the air.  The amount of viral shedding is the dose you are spreading around.  Some people for whatever reason have been seen to be Super Spreaders (or Super Shedders).  Even if they have no symptoms (asymptomatic).   In countries like where I live (USA) the people who track the virus infections after the fact (Tracers) have frequently linked infections back to single events (funerals, parties, bars) where one Super Spreader person infected a lot of people.

[TeeRick]

10 hours ago, D C said:

EXACTLY! 

Get ANY of the vaccines and you won't end up in the hospital or dead (at least not from covid).  I thought that was the goal all along. 

Yes that is the goal and it is working for the current mRNA vaccines being administered right now.  And the next round of vaccines about to be authorized by EUA in the US.   Also that goal is being met by the vaccines in the UK (AZ/Oxford) and in Russia (Sputnik V).  

[TeeRick]

Here is a nice Q&A from a senior R&D official from Pfizer which goes over their COVID vaccine efforts (ongoing and future) and speaks to variants as well.  Very informative.

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2021/02/question-choices-pfizer-vaccine-leader-confronting-new-coronavirus-variants