Covid-19 vaccines and vaccinations

India is about to launch one of the worlds largest public health initiatives by vaccinating ~300 million citizens for COVID through July!

*150,000 staff mobilized in 700 districts.
*45,000 ice-lined refrigerators
*290,000 supply points

Godspeed.

In Canada, we have only vaccinated 0.73% so far. Our population 38 million.
 
I will be getting the vaccine when offered. Any side effects are better than getting the bug and it should make any infection less serious if I do catch it. We are not interacting with people except a weekly shop but that is still a slight risk.

At our local hospital things are falling apart. Wards are having to be closed because so many people are coming in infected, the covid wards are full and they are sending emails to all retired staff asking for volunteers. My worry is that hospital treatment may just not be available as there is a physical limit to resources.

Then the world is full of idiots. One auxiliary went to work after being tested but before the result came back so that was another ward closed and staff in quarantine.
 
Trish said:
I don't know what to do. As an over 70 in the UK, I'm likely to be invited to turn up somewhere and wait in a queue for the vaccine sometime in the next month.

I have been having the flu vaccine at home for the last few years with the GP agreeing I'm not well enough to go to the doctors' surgery for it, and she's been doing my daughter at the same time. But this year that wasn't offered, so we haven't had a flu vaccine either.

That means, even if I were well enough to sit up in a wheelchair possibly for hours in a queue, which I'm not, I would have to find someone to take me. I don't have any home helpers at the moment because of covid, so I don't have anyone to take me.

So it looks realistically like I would have to wait until someone can do me at home. That means, as I understand it, it would have to be the inferior astra zeneca vaccine, since it seems to be the only one robust enough to be taken to people's homes.

The Pfizer one is so delicate, I gather from a medical radio program last night, is that once in the last stages of preparation before injecting, it can't even be carried up stairs, let alone taken on a car journey to someone's house.

And then there's the added complication of needing to persuade the health authorities that my daughter comes in one of the vulnerable illness categories to be allowed to have the vaccine at all.

I want us both to have it, but it looks like we'll be at the end of the list, so a lot more months of isolation without any help or visitors ahead.
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The Moderna vaccine should also be an option for home vaccination - the news from BBC etc. is that the Moderna vaccine should be available in the "spring"!
 
Mithriel said:
I will be getting the vaccine when offered. Any side effects are better than getting the bug and it should make any infection less serious if I do catch it. We are not interacting with people except a weekly shop but that is still a slight risk.

At our local hospital things are falling apart. Wards are having to be closed because so many people are coming in infected, the covid wards are full and they are sending emails to all retired staff asking for volunteers. My worry is that hospital treatment may just not be available as there is a physical limit to resources.

Then the world is full of idiots. One auxiliary went to work after being tested but before the result came back so that was another ward closed and staff in quarantine.
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I've belatedly followed @Jonathan Edwards advice re shopping i.e. click & collect --- drive through in my case. Additional veg shop - I've explained that I've a vulnerable family member so they bring the shopping out to the street --- like a kidnap exchange!

I'd be similarly worried about my wife - underlying health condition - with limited capacity, you may not get access to ventilators etc.
 
A question re vaccines please.

I gather the vaccines basically expose a person's immune system to either a weakened form of the virus, or the spike protein, so that when the immune system is first challenged by it, and takes time to ramp up its defences, the vaccine does this without exposing the person to the virus itself, which would take advantage of the immune system's delayed response while it learns how to deal with it. And so if the real virus then comes along, the immune system's response time is much faster and more robust.

But we also know that vaccines are well short of 100% effective. So in the cases where a vaccine fails to protect, what part(s) of this mechanism is it that fails?

Would be interested to know.
 
lunarainbows said:
What are the stats on how effective the Astra Zeneca vaccine is / what’s the likelihood of becoming immune to covid after having the vaccine 3 months apart? And after one dose?
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As I understand it, you won't become immune to Covid, but the vaccination will reduce your chance of being severely hit by it. Allegedly.

Wonko said:
There was some stuff around the same time about a half second dose raising efficacy - I cannot be certain that this related to that vaccine or if it was about the Oxford one.
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That was the Oxford one, but it was the first dose administered as a half dose, and then the second as a full dose. All allegedly, of course.

This was largely before the Oxford one was approved so I'm reasonably certain that is the vaccine referenced (well that and the fact that as far as I know no one has ever claimed more than 70% efficacy for the Oxford vaccine - it's 'selling' point was that it was local, we had control over it, and that it didn't need ridiculously low temperatures to store it - not it's efficacy)
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When administered as per my statement above, the manufacturers claimed that it was, I think, 94% effective?

FMMM1 said:
The Moderna vaccine should also be an option for home vaccination - the news from BBC etc. is that the Moderna vaccine should be available in the "spring"!
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I think it was around Eastertime (Easter being the beginning of April this year).
 
Barry said:
A question re vaccines please.

I gather the vaccines basically expose a person's immune system to either a weakened form of the virus, or the spike protein, so that when the immune system is first challenged by it, and takes time to ramp up its defences, the vaccine does this without exposing the person to the virus itself, which would take advantage of the immune system's delayed response while it learns how to deal with it. And so if the real virus then comes along, the immune system's response time is much faster and more robust.

But we also know that vaccines are well short of 100% effective. So in the cases where a vaccine fails to protect, what part(s) of this mechanism is it that fails?

Would be interested to know.
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I’m no biochemist, but to the extent I understand it it’s simply that a few people’s systems will not mount a protective enough response to x or y vx, and that is the case with every vaccine.
BUT, the 2 dose vaccine for this bug seems to have been designed by the Chrysler Hemi people; the design spec simply said “Mo Powah!”, with the result being that even the 5% who caught the bug did not need to be hospitalized. It’s actually rather nice; it’s obvious that they’re not being cheap about this thing, they’re throwing everything they have at it. Politicians will &#[[%$ the administration of it (at least in New York State), but the lab folks did right.
 
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Years ago I knew a retired nurse whose ME had actually been triggered by being given the Hepatitis B vaccine at work and there seemed to be a lot of other healthcare workers similarly affected.

I think the ME Association & Charles Shepherd have had a longstanding interest in the role of vaccines as a cause of ME and did a poll which can be found here: We’re collecting information on hepatitis B vaccination and ME/CFS – can you help? | 13 January 2016 | The ME Association

There are other vaccines listed there as well and I'm quite surprised at the numbers.
 
meg22 said:
Years ago I knew a retired nurse whose ME had actually been triggered by being given the Hepatitis B vaccine at work and there seemed to be a lot of other healthcare workers similarly affected.

I think the ME Association & Charles Shepherd have had a longstanding interest in the role of vaccines as a cause of ME and did a poll which can be found here: We’re collecting information on hepatitis B vaccination and ME/CFS – can you help? | 13 January 2016 | The ME Association

There are other vaccines listed there as well and I'm quite surprised at the numbers.
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I came down with ME after a hepatitis A+B vaccination, got worse after the booster shot. I'm greatful for Shepherd's work on this. I feel it's important to talk about it and find out more, but I understand it's a "sensitive topic" especially now in the context of a pandemic.

I'm worried and having doubts... I understand that the covid vaccines are of a different type etc, but still... It's not only the vaccine I'm concerned about, but how extremely ill travel makes me, even if it's just 5 minutes by escorted patient transport lying down. I'm currently in the middle of the worst relapse I've ever experienced so far, 13 months now and it's still getting worse, caused by a neuro appointment at a nearby hospital :(

Would my body even be able to make use of the vaccine while in this very weakened state? Would I be physically able to make a second trip for the booster shot, in the middle of a monster relapse, and what would be the long-term consequences?

I've been in strict self-isolation so far, but I don't see it as a reliable long-term solution. As always in life, something unexpected might happen at any time that I don't have any control over, and there might not be any other option than to break the isolation. I might have to suddenly go to the hospital for some reason, or let plumbers in to do emergency repairs in my flat, what if my elderly parents suddenly need me to come help/stay at their house for some reason, or whatever. And there's always the potential risk of contaminated deliveries, if the virus enters the ventilation system etc. An infinite amount of unknowns.

I'm currently undecided, but leaning towards taking the vaccine if my GP recommends it. A lot depends on whether I would have to go to the hospital or not, if I could have it done at home.
 
Not everyone will be able to take the vaccine. Some ME patients may be in this group. Their best chance with this virus is if as many people as possible who can get vaccinated do so.

Basically, if you are not in contact with someone who is infected you will not get the disease. In late summer the numbers in Scotland were so low I ventured out shopping (a treat!).

Even with other people vaccinated and low numbers many of us may have to get people around us to take precautions for the foreseeable future as the disease is here for ever.

If it will be difficult to physically go for a vaccine or you think your symptoms will get worse it is perfectly reasonable to wait. The vaccine will always be there.
 
Wits_End said:
As I understand it, you won't become immune to Covid, but the vaccination will reduce your chance of being severely hit by it. Allegedly.



That was the Oxford one, but it was the first dose administered as a half dose, and then the second as a full dose. All allegedly, of course.


When administered as per my statement above, the manufacturers claimed that it was, I think, 94% effective?



I think it was around Eastertime (Easter being the beginning of April this year).
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I think the selling point for Oxford/AstraZenica was that it was cheap [£5 versus £50 for Pfizer] and the UK had ordered enough to vaccinate 50 million people -- oh and the virus is now out of control and our hospitals are pretty much swamped.
 
meg22 said:
Years ago I knew a retired nurse whose ME had actually been triggered by being given the Hepatitis B vaccine at work and there seemed to be a lot of other healthcare workers similarly affected.
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I had a sudden viral onset in 1991 but was able to continue my studies and working feeling 'unwell'. It was when I received the second Hep B jab 3 months later that everything went downhill. I seem to recall through Dr. B Hyde's investigation during that time that contaminated vaccines were sent to Canada (from England) and were given to ppl knowing they were contaminated.

I'm not concerned about getting the COVID vaccine. I don't want to live my life worrying.
 
Snow Leopard said:
They are no longer claiming that the low-dose high-dose thing has 90% efficacy. That claim never had much statistical confidence anyway.
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Have they given an efficacy figure for the fulldose- fulldose administered 3 months apart?( Oxford)

I had the earlier Oxford figs in my head (62% vs 90%) but do not recall having seen a figure that just may be reliable for the proposed delivery roll out method- 2 full doses up to 3 months apart. I have read 70%, 80% and 89% but with no explanation of where the figures come from.
 
FMMM1 said:
The Moderna vaccine should also be an option for home vaccination - the news from BBC etc. is that the Moderna vaccine should be available in the "spring"!
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the Moderna vaccine needs -20 - wonder if it will be ok for housebound
 
Binkie4 said:
I had the earlier Oxford figs in my head (62% vs 90%) but do not recall having seen a figure that just may be reliable for the proposed delivery roll out method- 2 full doses up to 3 months apart. I have read 70%, 80% and 89% but with no explanation of where the figures come from.
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The Lancet paper stated there was no efficacy difference for a (reviewer requested) analysis of <6 weeks vs >6 weeks.

The judgment for the 12 week dosage is based on the antibody titre that showed that the ~12 week booster led to significantly higher antibody tires. This data was provided in the data considered by UK regulators.
But as I have explained previously, antibody titre is not the same as immunity or vaccine efficacy - the quality of the antibodies matters and that is where the ~3 week second dosage benefits over the 12+ week second dosage.
 
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