COVID-19

Tories have done a very good job with their populist politics in getting turkeys to vote for Christmas. Not dissimilar to Trump and his almost cult like status as he actually represented the exact opposite to the interests of most that worship the ground he walks on.

I notice Boris actually said let's get vaccination done at one of his latest C-19 briefings. Had to lol.

Vaccination here doesn't matter a damn in ending the global pandemic. Until that ends we don't get any normality back unless we have low prevalence of COVID-19, effective track and trace, and an inward quarantine policy to effectively limit import of new strains.

A half vaccinated population is actually a breeding ground for new strains which will prolong the current situation. In a population with no immunity viruses have no incentive to mutate (hence why COVID-19 has been largely stable till recently). In an immune population the vaccine has nowhere to go. In a partially immune (vaccinated population) the virus does what it does best and finds a new way to populate hosts and do it's thing.

Viruses and the tories have one thing in common - self interest.

 

No matter where your political loyalties lie, surely there is no denying that Boris and the Government are to be applauded for their vaccination programme.

 

It takes a pretty strongly biased viewpoint to find a negative in an efficient vaccine programme. I'm quite impressed.

I'm not sure that covid has been stable until recently rather, I seen to recall that scientists claimed it has mutated thousands of times throughout the course of the pandemic. We - and particularly the UK - have just got better at spotting them quickly I belive. Interested to see any alternative research though.

 

I wasn't trying to find a negative in the vaccine programme - sorry if it sounded like that. However, the vaccine programme roll out here doesn't excuse other obvious and catastrophic failures during the handling of the pandemic.

I am basing the comment on modelling from the Harvard School of Public Health which rather inconveniently I can't find a link to right now - I'll try harder

BMJ are holding another relevant webinar on Thursday - looks like this will directly address questions about current variants and evolution of variants and how vaccination influences that https://www.bmj.com/company/webinars/

 

Actually I'd prefer to applaud colleagues in the NHS responsible for the vaccine roll out. Boris and colleagues elbow bumping at vaccination centres doesn't excuse them their incompetence, criminality (not publishing details of contracts awarded that blunted the efficiency of our response), and the devastating impacts their handling has had on the economy and public health. So yes I will deny them that applause.

 

It doesn't, but similarly the previous mistakes which may have been made don't require the vaccination programme to be downplayed. Every aspect of it can be judged in isolation.

Got an article from September (https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02544-6) which says there were more than 12,000 mutations at that point. It does note that covid is more stable than other viruses but it's still a lot of mutations!

I'm sure the headlines from anything to do with mutations and variants will be purposefully scary but until a mutation actually occurs that is proven to get around the vaccines then it just is what it is. The scientists have to work around it like they do with the flu variants and the media have to be a bit controlled in their reporting (as if!) of "potential" issues

 

As you can tell I am not a fan of our government - but I am not basing my views on headlines. This is a small study about the South African variant and efficacy of the Oxford Astrazeneca in preventing mild to moderate infection;

https://www.wits.ac.za/covid19/covid19-news/latest/oxford-covid-19-vaccine-trial-results.html

Surge testing is ongoing across the UK in an attempt to stop the South African and other variants becoming prevalent before we have modified vaccine boosters (which are in development).

Genomic sampling is only done on 5% of PCR tests - do the maths lol!

I am a natural pessimist and hope to be proven so but if that's the case this government shouldn't claim that the vaccine programme (rolled out by the NHS, not the private sector as per the failed PPE / test and trace / etc.) shows they did a good job.

 

And that's fine if I spelled out that we're only talking about moderate or mild disease but all the restrictions and "fuss" about covid isn't because of the mild symptoms, it's simply because it kills people. If the vaccines still do that then they still "work".

Variations will happen, and will always happen. The flu vaccines are changed every year to respond to mutations (the 2020 injection included individual protection for 4 different strains I believe) and how long as that been around? That's for the scientists to solve and not for the public to worry about every time something MIGHT allow for mild infections to occur.

And being a natural pessimist is fine and you'll find plenty of support on here if you take the viewpoint that the government did a poor job on some aspects of the last year but the vaccination system definitely isn't one of them.

 

Did you read the link? The Oxford / Astra vaccine does not "work" well against the South African variant. If it doesn't do well at preventing mild and moderate disease in younger and healthier healthcare workers, it most probably doesn't do well at preventing ......................... wait for it ................... clue for you ..................... deaths????

That's probably why it isn't being used in South Africa any more?

All of the COVID vaccine trials look at symptomatic infection (e.g. mild to moderate), not deaths (as the endpoint). A trial looking at deaths would take too long to do as that's a comparatively rare (er) outcome than infection. We didn't know the vaccines would work to prevent deaths until using them in populations. Of course if they prevent (symptomatic) infection (mild to moderate) they are likely to prevent hospitalisations and deaths.

Had the trial of the Oxford / Astra vaccine shown efficacy of 22-23% as that study suggests for the South African variant then we would not be using it on a population level.

The Johnson and Johnson however - oh wait a minute we didn't order any of that one.

 

Sorry to be sarcastic but I am just trying to make the point that patting the government on the back for signing a few contracts and seemingly getting ahead of what is a very complex game is just too simplistic. They have been advised about variants for some time (read some of the SAGE documents) and totally ignored the threat. I hope I am wrong.

 

Yeah I read it.....it literally says....

"The vaccine provides minimal protection against mild-moderate COVID-19 infection from the B.1.351 coronavirus variant first identified in South Africa in mid-November 2020.

Efficacy against severe COVID-19 infection from this variant was not assessed."

And

"Recent data from a study in South Africa sponsored by Janssen which assessed moderate to severe disease, rather than mild disease, using a similar viral vector, indicated that protection against these important disease endpoints was preserved"

So there's no need to assume it won't. Just deal with the information that is actually presented rather than outcomes that specifically aren't. There's an enormous difference in any vaccine between just removing the worst symptoms and having complete reduction in all effects, they don't necessarily follow each other which is why that point about the limitations of the study is made.

And I've read most of the SAGE advice, they have been warned about variants but none of them so far have actually caused major concern about serious disease with the ability to get around vaccines. It doesn't mean there isn't a possibility of it but at the moment a variant that does that does not exist.

 

You do realise that the Janssen vaccine is the Johnson and Johnson vaccine don't you i.e. the vaccine I mentioned above? I don't think you do to be honest. The link talks about that vaccine but the study referred to looked at the efficacy of the oxford / astrazenaca in South Africa. Those two vaccines ARE NOT the same.

One last try.

We DO NOT have the Jannsen (Johnson and Johnson) vaccine in the UK. Ironically the EU have made orders (imagine that - those useless Europeans).

We DO have the South African variant.

We use the oxford / astrazenaca predominantly.

Oxford / astrazeneca is 23% efficacious against the South African variant by the same measures we have used to judge efficacy against the currently most prevalent UK based variants.

If the South African variant were the prevalent (most common) variant nobody would recommend use of the vaccine that is the central pillar of our vaccination programme.

I hope the SA / amazonian / etc. variant doesn't become prevalent.

I am not trashing the vaccination programme, just don't listen to the tories when they said they did everything they could by leading on vaccination (that's not true either e.g. Israel) when they act surprised that the third wave powered by variants we could have quarantined for (and still are not) cause the third wave. Perhaps the £8 billion wasted on an ineffective track and trace system might also be relevant - surge testing very ineffective (I'll stop there).

I'm out of this discussion.

 

I know the janssen is the J&J one but the paragraph I copied links it back to the AZ version. I'd cropped it to save space but maybe need to me more specific.....

"Recent data from a study in South Africa sponsored by Janssen which assessed moderate to severe disease, rather than mild disease, using a similar viral vector, indicated that protection against these important disease endpoints was preserved. This could be relevant to the ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 vaccine (Astra Zeneca), which has been developed using similar technology as the Janssen vaccine, and for which vaccine induced immune responses are also similar"

So even that article is not only spelling out that they purposelly didn't measure severe disease in the initial study but is also trying to give reasons to err on the positives for those outcomes.

We don't have any of the J&J vaccine here at the moment - not that it particularly matters since it hasn't been approved yet (but shortly will be) - but we do have between 30m and 52m doses on order so the government has thankfully gone down that path as well and will have them available eventually.

Overall though I don't understand what you're mad about. Are you annoyed that the scientists haven't produced a product that can block every aspect of every single strain? If so I think your expectations are a little high given the timescales. They're talking about being able to tweak the vaccine to work better on the SA variant by Autumn.

Are you annoyed that the UK government is using this product? That doesn't seem to make sense either given you acknowledge it works relatively perfectly against the strains over here.

So in general terms I think you're simply trying too hard to find a reason to be negative about a government you openly dislike. However there's nothing wrong with acknowledging that even institutions we don't like can actually do things well.

 

Hi Aaron,

I am mad at this government (thought that was clear). They continue not to take scientific advice on how to control the pandemic within these shores.

I am not mad at the scientists. I am a scientist (health researcher/scientist) - not involved in vaccine / virology / immunology but I am doing a different type of COVID-related research alongside my day research job.

See you at the BMJ webinar on Thursday? Should be interesting.

Cheers,

N.

 

Great debate @nicknameless & @Aaron Baker, nice to see opinions being challenged and the replies not degenerating into point scoring.

 

Unfortunately the government have to look further than just listening to scientific advice, right or wrong they have to face the consequences of how the UK economy would react to a stricter lock down to the advice the scientists are offering.
It's the party in power at the time that has to make the relevant calls, easy for the opposition to sit back and tell anyone who'd listen we'd do it differently.

Just reading the government are offer help to AstraZeneca’s UK as most of the vaccines used in the UK are produced in Britain, ministers have begun to draw up plans to make Britain's jab manufacturing more self-reliant.

 

@Bronco I see and hear that point of view. My point and contention is that the government have neither protected public (I nearly wrote pubic lol - that's a different debate) health or our economy. I think that has been a false narrative all along - a choice between health and the economy, lockdown or jobs. The two are inextricably linked. Failure to take early, definitive, effective (and constant) action has meant that financially we are also one of the hardest hit. If our financial outcomes from this pandemic end up comparatively good and our public health outcomes poor (they are virtually the worst in the world), or vice-versa then I think that argument holds water. When both look attrocious then it becomes a difficult argument to win.

There were no easy decisions in this and it's a fantastically awful natural experiment that I hope we can learn from for forward planning, using science not politics. However, I just don't hold with the "it's a difficult job" or "it's the economy or lockdown" narratives. They are very convenient politically. This government is incompetent, populist, and self-interested (IMHO). They are a danger to your's, mine and our families health and prosperity.

 

I do get your point but specifically with the vaccine rollout I don't see any element of the scientific advice they are ignoring. It looks almost textbook. The only possible "criticism" is that the vaccines might not work on variants but we both agree that the scientists can't be blamed for that and the government can't affect it I think.

In terms of the wider issues I think SOME of the deviations from the science have been overblown - purposefully is some instances by the media - especially when groups like SAGE have provided a range of purely scientific viewpoints with the "best" being very much an idealistic scenario but it is then made out like they were telling the government that this course of action is the only one to follow....which is rarely, if ever, actually the case. You will know that though.

We all know that from a scientific point of view the best way to fight the virus would be to stop all travel and lock each of us in our homes until the virus goes away from the world altogether. That's clearly unrealistic but it could be said that any devation from that is "ignoring the science" if we were that way inclined.

Weirdly enough my criticism of the government has usually come from the opposite viewpoint than most. I prioritise personal freedoms and personal responsibility so whole most have been critical of their response being generally too slow I'm much more wary about the long term impacts of their grabbing at additional powers. The recent "ban" on public protests under the guise of covid promotions being an obvious one.

But the key point at the moment is the rollout and as far as I can see there is simply nothing to complain about with it. Even as someone whose turn has not yet come I think its probably one of the most efficient things any UK government has achieved in my lifetime.