7 ms·

Many of those like OC43 and NL63 are extremely deadly to the elderly and have been known to have around 5-8% mortality in nursing homes. For everyone else, we

Many of those like OC43 and NL63 are extremely deadly to the elderly and have been known to have around 5-8% mortality in nursing homes. For everyone else, we should have a vaccine in the next 2-3 months.

epmaybe 6y ago
I really doubt that we will have a vaccine for the general population in 2-3mo. No vaccine manufacturer that I know of is even expecting phase 3 results until the end of this year at the earliest. And then you have to start using supply for first responders, healthcare workers, etc. and then move to gen. pop.
- SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
  We won't have enough supply for the general population, but ramping up the supply of a cold virus inoculation would run into mostly the same challenges.
  - __blockcipher__ 6y ago
    It should theoretically be a lot more scalable to just culture en masse. Since you’re not doing any modifications. Altho if they required testing of the culture to ensure no mutation that would slow things down
    - vibrio 6y ago
      Growing wild-type coronavirus is easier than making the current vaccine approaches? How/Why? As someone familiar with virology and cGMPs, I don’t see how that is the case.
      - __blockcipher__ 6y ago
        My thinking is that culturing massive amounts is incredibly scalable since there's no need to inactivate or perform other steps to render the virus safe. You're just culturing a fuckton of virus in a medium like agar.
  - nicoburns 6y ago
    > ramping up the supply of a cold virus inoculation would run into mostly the same challenges If you can let people actually catch the virus, then can't you avoid a lot of the vaccine production by letting people spread it to each other?
- CyanLite4 6y ago
  Pfizer and Moderna each are lined up to produce 100 million doses each by end of the year. Pfizer’s CEO thinks we can get approval by October. https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/washington-post-live/wplive/october-is-coming-pfizer-ceo-says-the-company-could-begin-seeking-approval-for-vaccine-in-october/2020/08/06/f216f295-eade-44d5-8b87-a59e7c15c59e_video.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/washington-post-live/wp... AstraZenica also to provide 300 million doses starting in October. https://www.hhs.gov/about/news/2020/05/21/trump-administration-accelerates-astrazeneca-covid-19-vaccine-to-be-available-beginning-in-october.html https://www.hhs.gov/about/news/2020/05/21/trump-administrati...
  - djsumdog 6y ago
    I can only see this as being a disaster. Vaccines need very careful testing before administering them to millions of people.
    - PakG1 6y ago
      The worst part is that anti-vaxxers would be able to say, "See??? I was right!!!! You're all idiots!!!!!!"
      - tux1968 6y ago
        The worst part would be the negative effects visited upon the people taking the unproven vaccine.
      - __blockcipher__ 6y ago
        Saying “vaccines are safe” is like saying “drugs are safe”. Without qualification it’s a lie. Drugs tested to be safe are safe. Vaccines tested to be safe are safe. The problem with the whole anti-anti-vaxxer thing is that any nuance gets lost. I’ve been called an antivaxxer (on the internet) for stating that I don’t want to take a poorly tested vaccine candidate. Personally I am not afraid of SARS-CoV-2, for someone in my risk category the risk of bad outcomes is vanishingly low. Whereas a rushed out novel vaccine - which by definition cannot be tested for long term effects - is much more risky, personally. BTW, because both the mortality and unproven (and imo nonexistent) “long term impacts” of COVID-19 are so dramatically overblown, the threshold for “this vaccine is safe” will be very loose IMO. Especially simce you can argue that the societal benefit of the vaccine means it’s worth more risk than the risk of COVID infection. Fortunately, most of the US is practically begging for a vaccine and will take it as soon as available, so at least we’ll have great data. (Provided negative reactions aren’t suppressed as censored the way legitimate scientific papers have been)
- paganel 6y ago
  > I really doubt that we will have a vaccine for the general population in 2-3mo. Even so, the logistics I think will add another extra year (at least for the "Western" countries, which I'm pretty sure will forget about the "equality for all humans" mantra and will scramble to get first in line). For the roughly 3.4-5 billion people that we need to vaccinate in order to begin to get herd immunity I honestly think we're looking at a 3-5 year timeframe (at least).
cco 6y ago
> For everyone else, we should have a vaccine in the next 2-3 months. This is a naive question, but to my knowledge there has never been a widely successful and safe vaccine developed for a coronavirus, am I wrong? People have been talking vaccine, but I've always thought that coronavirus, i.e. common cold family, has been nearly impossible to nail down with a vaccine. You seem a lot more confident so I must be in the wrong here.
- cycomanic 6y ago
  AFAIK there has never been much of an effort, because it is not a high priority vaccine. Based that all vaccinations can have a side effect, why would you develop a vaccine for it. And for the other SARS I suspect they were to quickly contained by other means to warrant development of a vaccine.
- usrusr 6y ago
  Vaccinating away a single cause of common cold out of many causes would seem almost pointless. I'd take it as a given that lack of seriously trying has been playing a major role in that lack of success.
- vibrio 6y ago
  I think this is an economic barrier more than a scientific one (not that the science is trivial). MERS is too sporadic. SARS burnt out to quickly to substantially test anything clinically, and if you look at the scientifc literature, interest in SARS dropped pretty quickly. I’m general neither industry or investors or government funding has that much interest in Infectious disease (vs cancer for instance). Pandemic preparedness was a horrible business plan.
- auspex 6y ago
  Also we have a coronavirus vaccine for pets and livestock that you can buy today.
raxxorrax 6y ago
My bet is 2-3 month + a year for broadest applications, some experimental ones might be available sooner.

epmaybe 6y ago

I really doubt that we will have a vaccine for the general population in 2-3mo. No vaccine manufacturer that I know of is even expecting phase 3 results until the end of this year at the earliest. And then you have to start using supply for first responders, healthcare workers, etc. and then move to gen. pop.

SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
We won't have enough supply for the general population, but ramping up the supply of a cold virus inoculation would run into mostly the same challenges.
- __blockcipher__ 6y ago
  It should theoretically be a lot more scalable to just culture en masse. Since you’re not doing any modifications. Altho if they required testing of the culture to ensure no mutation that would slow things down
  - vibrio 6y ago
    Growing wild-type coronavirus is easier than making the current vaccine approaches? How/Why? As someone familiar with virology and cGMPs, I don’t see how that is the case.
    - __blockcipher__ 6y ago
      My thinking is that culturing massive amounts is incredibly scalable since there's no need to inactivate or perform other steps to render the virus safe. You're just culturing a fuckton of virus in a medium like agar.
- nicoburns 6y ago
  > ramping up the supply of a cold virus inoculation would run into mostly the same challenges If you can let people actually catch the virus, then can't you avoid a lot of the vaccine production by letting people spread it to each other?
CyanLite4 6y ago
Pfizer and Moderna each are lined up to produce 100 million doses each by end of the year. Pfizer’s CEO thinks we can get approval by October. https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/washington-post-live/wplive/october-is-coming-pfizer-ceo-says-the-company-could-begin-seeking-approval-for-vaccine-in-october/2020/08/06/f216f295-eade-44d5-8b87-a59e7c15c59e_video.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/washington-post-live/wp... AstraZenica also to provide 300 million doses starting in October. https://www.hhs.gov/about/news/2020/05/21/trump-administration-accelerates-astrazeneca-covid-19-vaccine-to-be-available-beginning-in-october.html https://www.hhs.gov/about/news/2020/05/21/trump-administrati...
- djsumdog 6y ago
  I can only see this as being a disaster. Vaccines need very careful testing before administering them to millions of people.
  - PakG1 6y ago
    The worst part is that anti-vaxxers would be able to say, "See??? I was right!!!! You're all idiots!!!!!!"
    - tux1968 6y ago
      The worst part would be the negative effects visited upon the people taking the unproven vaccine.
    - __blockcipher__ 6y ago
      Saying “vaccines are safe” is like saying “drugs are safe”. Without qualification it’s a lie. Drugs tested to be safe are safe. Vaccines tested to be safe are safe. The problem with the whole anti-anti-vaxxer thing is that any nuance gets lost. I’ve been called an antivaxxer (on the internet) for stating that I don’t want to take a poorly tested vaccine candidate. Personally I am not afraid of SARS-CoV-2, for someone in my risk category the risk of bad outcomes is vanishingly low. Whereas a rushed out novel vaccine - which by definition cannot be tested for long term effects - is much more risky, personally. BTW, because both the mortality and unproven (and imo nonexistent) “long term impacts” of COVID-19 are so dramatically overblown, the threshold for “this vaccine is safe” will be very loose IMO. Especially simce you can argue that the societal benefit of the vaccine means it’s worth more risk than the risk of COVID infection. Fortunately, most of the US is practically begging for a vaccine and will take it as soon as available, so at least we’ll have great data. (Provided negative reactions aren’t suppressed as censored the way legitimate scientific papers have been)
paganel 6y ago
> I really doubt that we will have a vaccine for the general population in 2-3mo. Even so, the logistics I think will add another extra year (at least for the "Western" countries, which I'm pretty sure will forget about the "equality for all humans" mantra and will scramble to get first in line). For the roughly 3.4-5 billion people that we need to vaccinate in order to begin to get herd immunity I honestly think we're looking at a 3-5 year timeframe (at least).

cco 6y ago

> For everyone else, we should have a vaccine in the next 2-3 months. This is a naive question, but to my knowledge there has never been a widely successful and safe vaccine developed for a coronavirus, am I wrong? People have been talking vaccine, but I've always thought that coronavirus, i.e. common cold family, has been nearly impossible to nail down with a vaccine. You seem a lot more confident so I must be in the wrong here.

cycomanic 6y ago
AFAIK there has never been much of an effort, because it is not a high priority vaccine. Based that all vaccinations can have a side effect, why would you develop a vaccine for it. And for the other SARS I suspect they were to quickly contained by other means to warrant development of a vaccine.
usrusr 6y ago
Vaccinating away a single cause of common cold out of many causes would seem almost pointless. I'd take it as a given that lack of seriously trying has been playing a major role in that lack of success.
vibrio 6y ago
I think this is an economic barrier more than a scientific one (not that the science is trivial). MERS is too sporadic. SARS burnt out to quickly to substantially test anything clinically, and if you look at the scientifc literature, interest in SARS dropped pretty quickly. I’m general neither industry or investors or government funding has that much interest in Infectious disease (vs cancer for instance). Pandemic preparedness was a horrible business plan.
auspex 6y ago
Also we have a coronavirus vaccine for pets and livestock that you can buy today.

raxxorrax 6y ago

My bet is 2-3 month + a year for broadest applications, some experimental ones might be available sooner.