Covid-19 vaccine thread

[danielravennest]

Wow. There's no registration site for people in California, as far as I can tell.
How does one find such animals? I keep looking on the Kaiser site and they keep saying "We don't even have enough for our staff, let alone the proles who don't work here, so stop asking."

It appears to be by county: LA County COVID-19

 

[Innula Zenovka]

It takes about 4 weeks after the second injection before your immunity is at peak level. That is normal.
The flue shots usually need 6 weeks to reach the optimum protection.
And....... 90% protection (which is really high) means still 10% chance you can get infected and show symptoms.
To compare flue shots offer normally about 60% protection.
Huge advantage, vaccinated people often get a lot milder symptoms if infected.

A lot depends on in how good shape your immune system is.
Underlying other diseases and age play an important role as well in how high your personal protection figures are.

The point about vaccines isn't just that they provide enhanced protection, so that there's a 90% in any given situation that you're protected, but that, even if someone does contract Covid after being vaccinated, as far as we know they'll be asymptomatic, so all they have to worry about is self-isolating.

At least that's the guidance from the NHS, but I don't know how much notice people will take of it.

To my mind, there are two separate questions for me, after I'm vaccinated -- first, how soon can I feel safe going about my daily business, which will be however many weeks after my second shot, and second, how soon can social distancing measures be relaxed, which will be at some point in the future when sufficient people have been vaccinated to stop the virus from spreading.

 

[Sid]

When more than 60-70% of the population got their vaccination herd protection could start to kick in.
That's how it works with a lot of other viruses. Hence the vaccination programs for babies and children.
But we don't know about corona viruses yet. The usual 'colleagues' of covid-19 were simple colds for us humans, so we never bothered to develop a vaccine to try to establish herd immunity. And no country has enough people vaccinated yet to know what happens then.

The EU stampede about the vaccines has at least as a result, that various vaccine producers are stepping up production.
So we should know somewhere in the second half of the year if herd imunity kicks in and we can leave the 6 feet society again.
In the UK maybe even sooner. They have developed a nice head start on the continent by not participating with the EU in the clearance and obtaining vaccines.
That was a bit of a gamble, but the dices rolled in the right direction for the UK.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

When more than 60-70% of the population got their vaccination herd protection could start to kick in.
That's how it works with a lot of other viruses. Hence the vaccination programs for babies and children.
But we don't know about corona viruses yet. The usual 'colleagues' of covid-19 were simple colds for us humans, so we never bothered to develop a vaccine to try to establish herd immunity. And no country has enough people vaccinated yet to know what happens then.

The EU stampede about the vaccines has at least as a result, that various vaccine producers are stepping up production.
So we should know somewhere in the second half of the year if herd imunity kicks in and we can leave the 6 feet society again.
In the UK maybe even sooner. They have developed a nice head start on the continent by not participating with the EU in the clearance and obtaining vaccines.
That was a bit of a gamble, but the dices rolled in the right direction for the UK.

That's because we spread our bets and spent far more heavily -- I can't find the article offhand (it must have been in the FT, Times or Guardian, I think) but I'm sure I read that the UK spent something like £1.9 bn pre-ordering vaccines before they'd been approved (and before we knew they even worked, I think) from 6 different suppliers, while the whole of the EU spent £1.7 bn.

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

Do you remember Sputnik V? The anti corona vaccine developed in Russia and used by Russia, which was ready August 2020, so months before Western vaccines entered the market? Where many thought it's just a piece of Russian propaganda, nothing more, due to lack of studies and discarded it entirely as useless trash?

Well there is now peer reviewed study by the EMA, and they do show an amazing efficiency of 91.6% after the first dose, they also do consider it safe to use. The study has been published in the Lancet. Sputnik V uses a vector virus, just like AstraZeneca. AstraZeneca though has only an efficiency of around 70%. This is good news for Africa and such, because Sputnik V can be kept cold using a normal refrigerator compared to other vaccines, which do require much more cooling.

Basically Sputnik V was created using the same methods used by AstraZeneca, but a little bit more clever: dose 1 uses a different virus than dose 2 does, and this is done on purpose.

Also known as Gam-COVID-Vac, the vaccine uses a heterologous recombinant adenovirus approach using adenovirus 26 (Ad26) and adenovirus 5 (Ad5) as vectors for the expression of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) spike protein. The use of two varying serotypes, which are given 21 days apart, is intended to overcome any pre-existing adenovirus immunity in the population. Among the major COVID vaccines in development to date, only Gam-COVID-Vac uses this approach; others, such as the Oxford–AstraZeneca vaccine, use the same material for both doses.

Sputnik V COVID-19 vaccine candidate appears safe and effective

Denis Logunov and colleagues1 report their interim results from a phase 3 trial of the Sputnik V COVID-19 vaccine in The Lancet. The trial results show a consistent strong protective effect across all participant age groups. Also known as Gam-COVID-Vac, the vaccine uses a heterologous...

www.thelancet.com

 

[Stora]

I've always associated the word Sputnik with Russian satellites so looked up the word Sputnik , apparently it means traveling companion.

Traveling companion number 5 is a great name for a vaccine.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Thread

 

[Sid]

Do you remember Sputnik V? The anti corona vaccine developed in Russia and used by Russia, which was ready August 2020, so months before Western vaccines entered the market? Where many thought it's just a piece of Russian propaganda, nothing more, due to lack of studies and discarded it entirely as useless trash?

Well there is now peer reviewed study by the EMA, and they do show an amazing efficiency of 91.6% after the first dose, they also do consider it safe to use. The study has been published in the Lancet. Sputnik V uses a vector virus, just like AstraZeneca. AstraZeneca though has only an efficiency of around 70%. This is good news for Africa and such, because Sputnik V can be kept cold using a normal refrigerator compared to other vaccines, which do require much more cooling.

Basically Sputnik V was created using the same methods used by AstraZeneca, but a little bit more clever: dose 1 uses a different virus than dose 2 does, and this is done on purpose.

Also known as Gam-COVID-Vac, the vaccine uses a heterologous recombinant adenovirus approach using adenovirus 26 (Ad26) and adenovirus 5 (Ad5) as vectors for the expression of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) spike protein. The use of two varying serotypes, which are given 21 days apart, is intended to overcome any pre-existing adenovirus immunity in the population. Among the major COVID vaccines in development to date, only Gam-COVID-Vac uses this approach; others, such as the Oxford–AstraZeneca vaccine, use the same material for both doses.

Sputnik V COVID-19 vaccine candidate appears safe and effective

Denis Logunov and colleagues1 report their interim results from a phase 3 trial of the Sputnik V COVID-19 vaccine in The Lancet. The trial results show a consistent strong protective effect across all participant age groups. Also known as Gam-COVID-Vac, the vaccine uses a heterologous...

www.thelancet.com

I remember my reaction here on these forums when the Russian vaccine was discussed first:
Russian scientists don't live on the backside of the moon.

Thanks to our own western world propaganda machinery we killed it before they got a chance.
We are simply trained through the years, to assume nothing good can come out of Russia.

 

[Veritable Quandry]

It was not simply because it is Russian. It was because the trials were rushed. That fortunately does not appear to have hidden any problems, but it had the potential to. If the Trump FDA had shortcut trials, I would also be suspicious. As it turns out, we have a number of vaccines with robust multinational testing. Now that the Russian data is peer reviewed, I am more confident in it.

eta: Obligatory Sputnik

 

[Sid]

As if the Western world vaccine trails were not rushed.
What normally takes a few years was crammed into less than a year as well.
And that is possible because they did not start from scratch with the technology. They had their technologies most likely in house already in an advanced stadium of development on both sides.
The severity of the covid-19 virus triggered them to start to use it.

And Russia tested on two continents as well. (European part of Russia and Asian part of Russia )
But because they had enough covid cases in their own country, they did not need to go to Brazil for extra cases.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

 

[Free]

 

[Sid]

The protection degree matters too.
It should not be below 50-60%.
I miss those figures in the tweet's table above.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Oxford jab could be 'holy grail' as results show it reduces transmission | ITV News

Before these results, little was known about how effective the Covid-19 vaccines were at preventing transmission of the disease. | ITV National News

www.itv.com

This is as important, if not more so, than the figure for individual protection, to my mind.

 

[Cindy Claveau]

I was a bit shocked to get an invitation from my own health care facility to take the vaccine. But husband and I are in different age groups so they weren't prepared to schedule us together. They quoted "occasional unreliability of supply" as a reason they couldn't just jab my husband at the same time as me. Whatever.

I'm down for Monday. I hate shots but this one I'm doing regardless. I don't plan to go out in crowds for a long time, yet, even after I'm vaccinated. While I might not have symptoms, I could still carry and pass the virus even after inoculation.

 

[Sid]

The six feet distancing and hand washing will have to stay in place until the end of the pandemic I guess.

 

[Khamon]

The six feet distancing and hand washing will have to stay in place until the end of the pandemic I guess.

The earliest we've been able to schedule initial vaccinations is March 23rd and that's only good if supply is available. That puts our second dose in April, and the six week antibody-building period in mid-June. So, yes, our household will be masking and continuing to observe precautions at least that long. If nothing else, it helps to set the example for people who might be relaxing their habits too early, and it's respectful of people who are still afraid of dying even when conditions are safer.

Oh and Sid, I never got by your old place to pick up the VVO Halloween Tree but would dearly love a copy if they're still available. I'll plant it permanently in my sky garden. Yes, people, I have, and use, one of Ingrid's prefab sky garden platforms nothing to see here please move along.

 

[Aribeth Zelin]

The six feet distancing and hand washing will have to stay in place until the end of the pandemic I guess.

Hell, I'm planning on masking for a good while yet too, it just means if I have to work a con this spring/summer, or when housemate has to, I'll be much less worried.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

The six feet distancing and hand washing will have to stay in place until the end of the pandemic I guess.

I don't yet know when I'll receive my first vaccination -- probably towards the end of this month, if I'm lucky, or some time in early or mid-March -- but as far as I'm concerned the vaccine simply means I can go about my daily business without being too worried I'll end up in hospital with Covid as a result of it.

Distancing, handwashing and lockdowns will stay until my government says otherwise, but at least I'll feel able to get my hair done and then stop for a coffee somewhere without feeling I'm taking my life in my hands, which will be more than enough of an improvement for me.

And it might mean my long-delayed visit to the Rijksmuseum to see the Rembrandts will at last take place -- it was supposed to happen about 30 years ago, but I had to cut short that visit to Amsterdam, and I've never made it back since.

I had been intending in 2018 to remedy that in 2019, but then I had to postpone until last year, and then 2020 happened, so I'm taking no more chances.

 

[Sid]

The earliest we've been able to schedule initial vaccinations is March 23rd and that's only good if supply is available. That puts our second dose in April, and the six week antibody-building period in mid-June. So, yes, our household will be masking and continuing to observe precautions at least that long. If nothing else, it helps to set the example for people who might be relaxing their habits too early, and it's respectful of people who are still afraid of dying even when conditions are safer.

Oh and Sid, I never got by your old place to pick up the VVO Halloween Tree but would dearly love a copy if they're still available. I'll plant it permanently in my sky garden. Yes, people, I have, and use, one of Ingrid's prefab sky garden platforms nothing to see here please move along.

The tree will be shipped soon (as soon as I will find it in my still constantly growing inventory).