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The Russian vaccine for Covid-19
- JoeAltmaier 6y agoFrom the article: "...the middle of a Pandemic is not the time to be cutting corners" I wonder when is the time
- nkoren 6y agoThat stood out to me as well. There's a real opportunity cost to not moving more deliberately: those few extra months represent several hundred thousand lives lost. Could a vaccine be worse than that? Of course if the answer is yes, then that would be horrific -- you wouldn't want to vaccinate hundreds of millions of people and then discover that you've unintentionally shipped Thalidomide 2.0. But at the same time, the probability of such risks should be balanced against the certainties of what will happen without a vaccine. Anybody who says that this is a simple or easy calculation frankly has no idea what they're talking about.
- ilikehurdles 6y agoIf it's a vaccine that does anything other than exactly what it's supposed to is going to erode public trust in any future vaccines that might actually work.
- ArkVark 6y agoCOVID has leapt from the realm of science and reason into fear and hysteria. If we 'saved' 1 million elderly people from dying of COVID, and they instead died over a period of time from vaccine side effects, those effects would be impossible to quantify via a binary PCR test and so would be ignored. Additionally if people were vaccinated, but still died, we could at least say 'oh well, we tried'. Rushing out a vaccine and giving it to people near the end of their natural lives is a completely legitimate decision to end this hysteria and get back to normal life.
- sobellian 6y agoElderly does not imply "near the end of their natural lives." Consider folks who are about to retire. They're certainly at risk but they still have a whole phase of their lives ahead of them.
- JoeAltmaier 6y agoAgreed. Here it means, older than 50. Which is still running marathons, still having children, still working, still riding century rides for some.
- tinus_hn 6y agoUnfortunately these kind of calculations clash with ethics. You can’t take actions that cause people to die, even if they prevent more other people from dying.
- qayxc 6y ago> I wonder when is the time Wartime would be such time - scarcity of resources in combination with lack of alternative measures. As long as simple measures like wearing masks, keeping your distance and minimising risky activities are sufficient, there is no rush. It's also not as if COVID-19 is a zombie apocalypse or some primarily airborne and highly infectious variant of Ebola that threatens to wipe out huge parts of the population within weeks or months.
- mchusma 6y agoThis same person says "the difference between doing things correctly and not doing things correctly is a matter of a few months". First, this is not a matter of "correct", it's a matter of "allowing people to voluntarily take additional risk on a vaccine similar to a phase III trial which we let people do already". Second, A "few months" is huge. Like a vaccine working a few months earlier would be the biggest global event of 2020. He must be in quite the nice position if the pandemic going an extra "few months" is no big deal.
- gdubs 6y agoLet’s say a vaccine is safe — you still have to know if it’s actually effective. That’s one of the things measured in these trials. We can’t just say, whoops, and mail a new dose to everyone. So, the risk isn’t just the safety. It’s about not squandering the precious resources that have been pulled together to manufacture distribute untold numbers of doses of a vaccine.
- BurningFrog 6y agoIn reality an emergency is of course exactly the time to take more risks.
- HhE3334R7hf1lLF 6y agoI'm no anti-vaxxer, but I cannot tell what's worse: a little known virus that hit us like an unexpectedly motile wall of bricks, or a rushed vaccine. I'd rather be exposed to neither, so I'll keep on keeping away from people until this thing blows over.
- bluGill 6y agoThere are some risks wroth taking and some that are not. The problem with risks in an emergency is they can make things worse. Emergency officers are often killed when they choose to risk going faster than the speed limit - even though they have sirens on to warn everyone they are taking extra risk for an emergency.
- BurningFrog 6y agoPart of the definition of risk is that it can make things worse! My point is that in emergencies, stakes are higher, so the potential benefit from taking a risk is higher.
- gdubs 6y agoI thought airline pilots and marines trained specifically to avoid taking unnecessary risks in an emergency. They rely on playbooks, checklists, training. There are also other tools left in the Arsenal before throwing Hail Mary passes — like, everyone could wear masks.
- wittyreference 6y agoIn this instance, cutting corners is equivalent to not gathering data, and acting on the premise that what you want to be true is true. Which is another way of saying: when there are massive consequences, is not the time to proceed on wishful thinking. Because, as TFA pointed out: if you give people an ineffective vaccine, they will act as though they have an effective vaccine, and likely increase spread. If you give someone a vaccine that has more antibody-mediated enhancement than protective effect (or at least, just a significant proportion of), you may do more harm than good as well. And once you've deployed the vaccine to the general population, you've significantly impaired your ability to resolve questions about the above. When stakes matter, and consequences are large and long-lasting, isn't the time to make blind leaps of faith.
- JoeAltmaier 6y agoOverstating it? Folks are not all behaving responsibly as it is, so nothing new there. Deploying in larger numbers, then measuring the result is gathering data too. There are massive consequences to the plague as it is.
- gdubs 6y agoI’m not an expert on this, but my guess would be: it’s logistically very difficult to produce the required number of doses. They’ve been gearing up all over the world to get ready. So, I would think that you really don’t want to spend those resources on a vaccine that’s either 1) not safe, or 2) not as effective as you thought it was.
- einpoklum 6y agoWhen the risks of cutting these corners are significantly outweighed by the risks of getting to a vaccine slower. With due respect to the many losses from Covid-19 - the numbers are not huge. 0.012% of the world's population has died from Covid over a period of about half a year. The annual death rate of all other causes in the world is 0.77%, or (normalizing to half a year) about 33 times as high. So, Covid is a serious pandemic but not terrible enough to risk significant corner-cutting in vaxine development - as I see it.
- SpaceRaccoon 6y ago> On the other hand, it is entirely possible that Russia will hold off vaccinating its general population until it has received favourable results from the phase 3 trial. In which case, the announcement of the approval of Sputnik V might amount to a political gesture, rather than a serious attempt to circumvent the standard process of vaccine development. Yes, it really was mostly a political gesture. General inoculation isn't planned for until Jan 1st, 2021.
- asdasfasdfasdf 6y ago"The amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than to produce it."
- owl57 6y agoAs far as I understood, from the bureaucratic point of view this was some kind of temporary approval needed to include risk groups in phase 3 trial, which could be a good thing given the general urgency of the situation. And then, yes, Putin made a political gesture out of this implementation detail.
- divbzero 6y agoLet’s hope under the covers things are progressing in the typical prudent manner. Even so, I worry about the extra pressure on phase 3 trials for a vaccine that’s already been announced publicly.
- ladberg 6y agoJan 1st is still way earlier than any other country could feasibly do it.
- rsynnott 6y agoExpect that to be pushed back if there are any hitches in what is, in reality a phase 3 trial. Which there probably will be; there generally are.
- eugene3306 6y agoThere are two vaccines on the final stages of development in Russia. One from Gamaleya center (Moscow), another from «VECTOR» facility (Novosibirsk). From my (layman's) point of view, Gamalaeya's vaccine is somewhat hurried in development. Also, Gamaleya is known for its lobbying power. In the past, it approved and popularized a number of controversial drugs like Kagocel and a few of «-feron» drugs. VECTOR's vaccine, on other hand, looks more trustworthy.
- romwell 6y agoVector is an established facility with a long history. I'd wait until Vector's stuff is ready if I were living in Russia.
- SomeoneFromCA 6y agoYes, as someone who lives in ex-USSR, I agree.
- drran 6y agoYep, Vector has a long history: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_w7SAeNcXA8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_w7SAeNcXA8
- ishcheklein 6y ago> Post-registration clinical trials involving more than 40,000 people in Russia will be launched in a week starting from August, 24. ... The vaccine has received a registration certificate from the Russian Ministry of Health on August 11 and under emergency rules adopted during the COVID-19 pandemic can be used to vaccinate the population in Russia. Mass production of the vaccine is expected to start in September 2020. It feels like it's "under emergency" marketing and it is still ongoing phase 3 trials. I hope they have enough sense to not mass vaccinate everyone in a month or two.
- ishcheklein 6y agoIt's actually here at the bottom: > On the other hand, it is entirely possible that Russia will hold off vaccinating its general population until it has received favourable results from the phase 3 trial. In which case, the announcement of the approval of Sputnik V might amount to a political gesture, rather than a serious attempt to circumvent the standard process of vaccine development. The FDA has stipulated that a vaccine against COVID-19 should be at least 50% effective. Sputnik V might well meet this criterion. But until the phase 3 trial is completed and the results are made available, it will not be possible to make any judgement. “It is certainly not advisable for any vaccine to be used in an uncontrolled way before it has been through proper testing to determine whether the immune response it produces is actually protective, and there are no unexpected adverse events”, stressed Openshaw.
- owl57 6y agoNo one has production capacity to vaccinate everyone in a month or two. So yes of course, they said only healthcare workers and teachers are going to get it this month, and not all of them. Will it be actually voluntary, as promised, or some new absurd process? You never can tell with Russian government.
- johnisgood 6y agoYeah, it could easily be mandatory. You must get the vaccination to work in health care. You must get the vaccination to be a teacher. You get the gist. We have this here with hepatitis B vaccine. Why not with this vaccine? They definitely could do this.
- m0zg 6y ago> One person to have received it is the president's daughter. Given that murdering Putin's daughter carries a near 100% risk of polonium poisoning, I very strongly doubt that she was used as a guinea pig. If any injection was done at all, it was most likely saline.
- idiocrat 6y agoWhy rolling out the heavy cannons? Would not it be cleaner to Epstanize the offender by turning off the surveillance camera in his/her cell for 5 minutes?
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- georgewsinger 6y agoGood for Russia: taking steps towards allowing free & consenting adults the ability to use an experimental vaccine at their own risk, should they consent to do so, and with the potential to generate massive positive externalities for the rest of the world in the process. How cringe is it that Russia (of all places) has beat the U.S. in allowing their population the right to access new technology? Literally hundreds of thousands of people have died during this pandemic, and our regulatory agencies have -- in the name of "protecting us" -- literally blocked off people from being able to experiment (on their own property) with ways to prevent the spread of more mass death. Unbelievable. Not to mention the tail risk of bottlenecking a life-saving vaccine until a government agency deems it "safe", and then suddenly releasing it all at once to massive portions of the population. If instead you let early risk-takers experiment on their own watch, you get orders of magnitude more data to work with gradually as opposed to suddenly unleashing a single vaccine (deemed "safe" by the FDA) to tends of millions of people at once.
- postpawl 6y agoHasn’t one of the major vaccine candidates failed out of the trails already?
- jccooper 6y agoPerhaps you're thinking of the pause in the AstraZeneca Phase 3 trial. That's common and it has resumed. So, in that case, no.
- brendoelfrendo 6y agoYes, AstraZeneca's trial was put on hold after a case of transverse myelitis. Obviously, in a large trial there's a chance the illness was unrelated to the vaccine, but this is one of those reasons why trials exist.
- codeulike 6y agoAnd now it has resumed
- 6y ago
- danjc 6y agoThe choice of name is interesting. Is this a throwback to the space race as in, “we got there first”?
- lacker 6y agoYes.
- Jetroid 6y agoFor those who didn't read the article yet, the vaccine is called 'Sputnik V'.
- somesortofsystm 6y agoSputnik means travel companion. In the context of COVID-19, its probably a bit more surreal than it ought to be, name-wise ..
- tetromino_ 6y agoIt's a two-component vaccine using two different adenovirus vectors. Hence "traveling companion" and "v(irus/ector)". Plus, of course, the name is a reminder of Soviet space achievements.
- aldanor 6y agoOn August 11th, 2020 the Russian government announced the world's first release of a vaccine against COVID-19, referring to the vaccine as "Sputnik 5" (Gam-COVID-Vac) to reflect Russia's previous victories in the Space Race. ([1]) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korabl-Sputnik_5 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korabl-Sputnik_5
- altcognito 6y agoWhat's weird to me is this emphasis on being first. Most of the media trumpeting that there will be some huge advantage to being first seems wrong and misplaced. Even if you manage to create a vaccine, you still have to manufacture and convince everyone it is effective. Rollout is likely to be pretty slow and uneven. This will take months. In the meantime, other vaccines will be created that work just as well. The vaccine might be manufactured faster and be distributed more widely. Create a vaccine isn't planting a flag or even reaching a specific destination. Creating a vaccine is travelling a known distance in similar types of cars. There's only so fast you can go.
- StriverGuy 6y agoI can't help but shake the feeling these comments have some pro-russian trolls/bots.
- ComodoHacker 6y agoThere were questions [0] to phase 1/2 results published data, which AFAIK has not been answered yet. 0. https://cattiviscienziati.com/2020/09/07/note-of-concern/ https://cattiviscienziati.com/2020/09/07/note-of-concern/
- ExcavateGrandMa 6y agoHIV has no vaccine... and covid is mutated HIV...
- dedosk 6y agoSeems like you can gain some hunting skills after using this vaccine: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vN2eQ_CKZT8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vN2eQ_CKZT8
- AJRF 6y agoOne interesting coronavirus metric I’ve been tracking is mobility indexes. I know it sounds tin-foil-hat-y but I don’t trust western media coverage on Russia or China and so to gauge the situation in those countries I’ve tried looking at data rather than opinion. The Citymapper app has a “CityMapper Mobility Index” which shows what percentage of a given city is moving compared to a pre-March peg. It’s been interesting to see Moscow and St.Petersburg back to almost 100% capacity.
- JacobAldridge 6y agoBut is ‘city mobility’ a lead indicator of ‘rising new COVID cases’, or a lag indicator of ‘declining active COVID cases’? I could make the hypothesis for either (or both), so are you using it to track improvements in a city or prepare for worsening conditions?
- derbOac 6y agoProbably both-- it's probably why these cycles occur. Modeling positivity with mobility would be interesting.
- DoofusOfDeath 6y agoI had never occurred to me that something could be a leading indicator for changes in one direction but lagging in another. Thanks for upgrading my thinking!
- JacobAldridge 6y agoThanks for the comment! I’ve been doing a bit of research into various economic indicators aiming to help my (business owner) clients, and it pretty rapidly becomes a complicated mess of cause and effect. Take Unemployment - a lag indicator of economic conditions (things were better/worse last month and so people found/lost work); but also in a small way a lead indicator of economic conditions (more people in/out of work and the wider confidence arising from the news has an impact on future spending).
- mellosouls 6y ago
- jojo2000 6y agoRussia's vaccine has been elaborated over a trusted, old and effective basis (innefective virus which triggers immune response). New mRNA vaccines are from the devil's lore as they are effective viruses that use your cell as a factory to produce what's needed to trigger immune response, tranforming us into GMOs...
- lame-robot-hoax 6y agoI mean, this is simply fear mongering and false information. The current favorite vaccine in the west is the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine which is recombinant viral vector vaccine. This is already commonly used for Hep B, HPV, Whooping Cough, Shingles, etc. I mean...transforming us into GMOs???
- jojo2000 6y agothis one ? https://www.statnews.com/2020/09/09/astrazeneca-covid19-vaccine-trial-hold-patient-report/ https://www.statnews.com/2020/09/09/astrazeneca-covid19-vacc... I persist about what I said, waiting for someone to demonstrate this is not the case ? Furthermore, there are a lot of controversies regarding HepB and HPV vaccines.
- lame-robot-hoax 6y agoIt’s almost like when you monitor tens of thousands of people you’re likely to discover an adverse health event that may have absolutely nothing to do with the vaccine.
- jojo2000 6y agowell 1) it's not ten of thousands 2) dramatic adverse immune reaction is common when designing a drug and should be avoided at all costs. bad vaccines are known to trigger such reactions in many cases, either due to active ingredient or excipients. Just means not safe, not ready.
- alextheparrot 6y ago
- Oricle 6y agoJews, always Jews. 80% of zionist that moved Israel (Jews are not supposed to own land, even it its a state, NOT a country) are from Russia! Bolsavicks? Jews UK ran by jews USA by jews Germany? Jews See a pattern? Lol Isralites vs Christians(and all gentiles, whether black white yellow pink blue or whatever lol) for last 2000+ years and guess who's losing? White race will have no homelands at all by 2060! Good goyhim(nation, cattle)
- StreamBright 6y agoI was just in a call with somebody who is working in the medical industry on COVID vaccine and he explained to me that GDPR puts many of their efforts in jeopardy because if any patient issues a deletion request they have to delete the data which is very ward for them. It is interesting to see how legislation can slow down progress.
- viraptor 6y agoWhat do you mean by puts in jeopardy? So they realistically expect that a large portion of the tested people will request to delete their data? Is there any basis for that? As I understand it's a very uncommon occurrence even in companies people really should be requesting it from.
- StreamBright 6y agoIt is enough that one requests it if the data system is not prepared for that.
- elliekelly 6y agoDid this anecdotal conversation actually happen? I'm highly skeptical for several reasons. The first being that GDPR's "right to be forgotten"[1] absolutely, unequivocally, without a shadow of doubt would not apply to a patient in a medical trial. Even if the patient withdrew consent for data processing and objected to the continued processing of their data under GDPR they still would not have the right to have the data deleted for several reasons: 1. The data isn't being processed on the data subject's consent alone. It's also being processed because it's necessary to perform a public task which is a legal basis for processing data under GDPR. It's also probably being processed under the "legitimate interests" of a third party (the pharmaceutical company) whose interests in the data, in this case, override the individual's interests in having the data deleted which is another legal basis for processing. So the medical trial has two (of only six) lawful bases for data processing should the patient withdraw consent. Only one lawful basis is necessary. 2. Article 17(3) specifically exempts compliance with the right to be forgotten when data processing is necessary "for reasons of public interest in the area of public health" (paragraph c) OR for record-keeping purposes "in the public interest, scientific or historical research purposes or statistical purposes" (paragraph d). 3. Article 17(1)c and Article 21(1) would allow continued processing of the data due to "compelling legitimate grounds for the processing which override the interests". 4. Article 21(6) would allow continued processing of the data for reasons of public interest. Surely someone in the EU conducting medical research would be well aware that GDPR is not at all a barrier to medical trial data processing. [1]https://gdpr.eu/article-17-right-to-be-forgotten/ https://gdpr.eu/article-17-right-to-be-forgotten/
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- 05 6y agoI hear it’s pretty effective, just ask Navalny
- rossdavidh 6y agoSo, I could totally believe that this is mostly a political gesture, and Russia is doing this mostly for propaganda purposes. But, honestly, even given that, I found the tone of the article to be biased and speculative, in an anti-Russia way. FUD should not be the main component of an article in a medical journal. Give us some facts about the situation, or if you don't have any facts to give, write a shorter article.
- lngnmn1 6y agoFacts: 76 healthy participants, 100% effectiveness. That must be a joke. And yes, a country which is famous for bullshit propaganda instead of technological advances is not expected to suddenly produce a word-class tech.
- danesparza 6y agoThat's just it. We don't have many facts about this vaccine other than it was rushed. Many folks are probably going to hear 'a vaccine has been created' and think it's a panacea. This article seeks to correct that by pointing out what we don't know about the trial (which appears to be a lot).
- ak217 6y agoThe second paragraph contains a link to the phase 1/2 results that the vaccine creators published in the same journal. Because of unexpected patterns in the data in those results, there are doubts about their veracity, which is consistent with the idea that the institute is cutting corners in the trial. If it turns out that they did make up the results and the vaccine is more dangerous and/or less effective than expected, the journal will be known as complicit in the backlash that ensues not just against this vaccine, but against all others as well. So the journal wanted to temper their implicit endorsement made by publishing the original article, and this is the result.
- thrwway34 6y agoPointing out facts is biased?
- pplonski86 6y agoThere is a Polish joke video about Russian vaccine https://youtu.be/vN2eQ_CKZT8 https://youtu.be/vN2eQ_CKZT8
- aaron695 6y agoYou can get 'vaccines' on the dark markets (ie Agartha). Hard to say if they are real. They say they are from animal and human trails. $500 No Russian vaccine yet I can see. But if it is being produced in India, which this is, along with permission for the Indians to produce it for internal use, then I'd guess it'll be available on the clearnet. Do you let your 80 year+ male family and friends risk death from Covid or buy it online... Plus of course to do it for fun.
- bart__ 6y agoDo you mean this agartha, reviews seem to indicate it is a scam? https://www.darknetstats.com/agartha-market/ https://www.darknetstats.com/agartha-market/
- aaron695 6y agoGood point. You definitely seem correct. Most of the big ones were being DOSed when I was checking. I found this which suggested Agartha, but they do actually mention it's not ‘approved’ by Darknetlive. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3581387 https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3581387 I wouldn't expect the Russian vaccine yet, and I'd google around before buying it. I'm already on a trial vaccine so I'm not supposed to get any other vaccines. But I might buy a non-animal vaccine for family when it comes out.
- jmull 6y ago> Hard to say if they are real. I think it's rather easy to say.
- _aleph2c_ 6y agoI would take it if it was available to me. The risk of a side effect seems much lower than the risk of catching or spreading the disease to others.
- andrepd 6y agoYou have absolutely no basis on which to make that statement. There is no data about the vaccine (and about the virus) to reasonably assert that the risk of the vaccine is lower than the (low) risk of infection if you take mitigation measures such as wearing masks and limiting interaction.
- charliebrownau 6y agoThe cure has existed since March 2020 . We dont need a magic needle from Bill Gates, Trump, China, Israel , Iran or Russia