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Sputnik V vaccine peer reviewed with efficacy of 91.6%

The_rationalist 6y ago
With Sinopharm at 79% and astrazeneca at 70% we can probably get enough manufacturing (and combined with a first doses first policy like UK is doing) for solving covid in a matter of a few months
- RL_Quine 6y ago
  As long as they have no shared supply chain.
  - athriren 6y ago
    the global medical raw material supply chain specifically for the kinds of chemicals needed for serological tests and the supply chain for equipment such as vials and racks are both incredibly fucked. the reason pfizer packaged its doses in larger than standard vials is because they literally could not procure the other kind in the volume needed and the time to retool the entire operation to load different sized vials only to unretool them wasnt worth the cost or time.
- mbergal 6y ago
  I understand that countries can license Sputnik V and produce it on their own equipment. Unless there is political pressure from US to not do that - https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2021-01-29/ukraine-bans-use-of-russian-vaccines https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2021-01-29/ukrain...
  - The_rationalist 6y ago
    Wow this is a game changer
abraxas 6y ago
I know this is published in the Lancet but the data is coming purely from Russia. While it’s still a data point of sorts I think it’s really prudent for the rest of the world to try and reproduce these results before taking them at face value. Sorry but this data is coming from a totalitarian country where everything is directly or indirectly state controlled. I’m quite skeptical that the Kremlin didn’t put their thumb on the scales at least a little bit when compiling these results. Since this vaccine is being sold left and right around the developing world we might in due course obtain more independent data about it. Until then it’s safer to say that the efficacy of this vaccine is basically unknown.
- Exmoor 6y ago
  While I share your concerns about the government, and was suspicious of the numbers (heck, more than suspicious, I dismissed them out of hand), the more data that we see the more reasonable they seem. Using two different adenoviruses was, in retrospect, a pretty brilliant choice to increase the boost give by the second dose. I think it's entirely reasonable that this would give an additional 10-20% efficacy over other adenovirus vaccines. I don't pretend to know how involved the Russian government was in the process, but it's a shame the scientists who designed this vaccine are tainted by the corrupt government of the country they live in.
  - abraxas 6y ago
    No question that Russia has some of the best minds in the world, still. But a big headline product like this would be incredibly tempting for the regime to exaggerate the efficacy of for propaganda reasons. That’s not to say the vaccine is not brilliant. It’s just that I’d say we still have insufficient evidence to assert that it is.
    - franklyt 6y ago
      The good money is on it being an exemplary vaccine. The Sputnik name and the glowing data we’ve heard about it. Besides, it’s not like you can trust big pharma only if has a Western brand slapped on it. Some of the worst drugs, possibly all of them (that I’m aware of), came from us.
doitLP 6y ago
I’m curious to see what the actual effectiveness (vs lab efficacy) is of all these vaccines. The gaps can be quite large.
- The_rationalist 6y ago
  Why would there be? It has been tested on 20000 persons from all age groups
- eloff 6y ago
  Why would you expect a large gap, that's not how statistics work. Any study of a sufficiently large population, like the phase 3 trials shouldn't vary much at all when scaled up to millions of participants. That's assuming the error bounds are small with the clinical trials, but I think that is universally the case here.
  - Franciscouzo 6y ago
    If you take into account herd immunity the actual effectiveness should be >99%.
    - eloff 6y ago
      Yeah, that's a good point. Obviously vaccinations benefit from network effects as the number of vaccinated individuals in the population increases - so over time this will skew the results towards higher efficacy.
  - doitLP 6y ago
    Efficacy describes what happens in a carefully controlled study. Vaccine efficacy is the percent reduction in disease incidence in a test group of vaccinated subjects compared to an unvaccinated group under optimal conditions. Such subjects usually do not have any underlying medical illnesses. Effectiveness describes what happens in the real world. Some tend to use ‘efficacy’ as if it is synonymous with the concept of ‘effectiveness’. This misuse is even rampant amongst doctors, who should know better. In fact, vaccine effectiveness is the ability of a vaccine to prevent outcomes of interest in the real world. For example, the influenza vaccine has been in use since 1938. It is spectacular at causing test subjects to make antibodies to the influenza virus. Now take a look at flu vaccine actual effectiveness (or lack thereof): There are universal recommendations to give flu vaccine to the elderly starting at age 65. A 2020 study [1] on the influenza vaccine in the UK compared outcomes when persons aged 65 to 75 got their yearly flu vaccines, compared to those of the same age who didn’t receive it. They were all followed for 4 years. The ones who got flu vaccine did not have any lower hospitalization rates or lower death rates (from all causes). This study showed that flu vaccine may be efficacious in controlled studies, but in real life it is often not effective in reducing death or hospitalizations – the outcomes of interest. [1] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32120383/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32120383/
boopmaster 6y ago
Hey guys, I’m mildly xenophobic and distrust people that are not from where I’m from. Can you help me out here because I’m pretty sure that we in America have contained this? I won't say airtight, but it's pretty close to airtight. Looking for national media that can cater to my overtly explicit biases and reinforce them in some kind of echo chamber. Thanks. /sarcasm
azinman2 6y ago
If this is true it’s great; the entire world needs to be inoculated for Covid to actually die out and not continue mutating year after year. Having an effective vaccine in Russia’s sphere of influence is a good thing.
ARandomerDude 6y ago
It's amazing and sad that so many comments in this thread are downvote grey. A controversial topic to say the least. To those downvoting the "I don't trust Russia" comments: step back and realize that this is HN and not Parler. If the HN crowd is this skeptical, how would something like this go over with the broader American/UK/EU/etc. public? My guess is not well. Trust but verify is probably the only realistic scenario if this vaccine is to be used in the West without a (larger) political storm.
- mbergal 6y ago
  We will see, joint AZ/Sputnik V trial is not causing any political storm yet: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-astrazeneca-russia/sputnik-astrazeneca-vaccine-trials-to-start-in-february-says-r-pharm-idUSKBN29O1BA https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-astraz...
klenwell 6y ago
I just happened to finish reading this recent New Yorker article about Sputnik V: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/02/08/the-sputnik-v-vaccine-and-russias-race-to-immunity https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/02/08/the-sputnik-v-... It covers the development of the vaccine as well as some of the controversy. After reading the article, I'd probably accept the vaccine if offered it. The author of the article did.
curiousllama 6y ago
If the vaccine is truly this effective, they’d release numbers like this. If the vaccine is completely useless or actively harmful, they’d release numbers like this. Very interested in reproduced results, but we have many vaccine leads in the West for now, so let’s invest in those.
corona-research 6y ago
Yeah, I am fully brain washed and I believe the mainstream narrative.
zoomablemind 6y ago
Why so much effort to sell that to the world? You've got a huge country with still very sizable population to protect against still very much active virus (plus the mutated versions). It works well without the Phase III? So be it. Isn't it about the very people of Russia? Now, they tell quantitatively that it has been just as good all along (wait, it's cheap too!). Well, even better - protect your people, maybe even start with the government. Russia is big!
- sam_lowry_ 6y ago
  Russian state has always been outward-looking and disrespectful of own population, and Putin is known to enjoy geopolitical games. Selling vaccine is a way to wield power. Unfortunately, Sputnik V is associated with Putin-the-Underpants-poisoner, 2014 Sochi Olympics, Civil war in Syria, Civil war in Ukraine, invasion of Crimea... and that association is not good.
  - apexalpha 6y ago
    I doubt a lot of people would even get the vaccine, if it would be offered in my country. There is a deep mistrust towards the Russian government. And I think this goes for Russians themselves as well. Which is a shame because Russian science is quite good, despite their own government.
    - selivanovp 6y ago
      You’re driven by prejudices and propaganda. Russia vaccinates own population in mass now. I got my first shot two weeks ago and on Monday gonna get a second, for free.
      - sam_lowry_ 6y ago
        This is exactly it. Main reason there are no queues to get vaccinated in Russia is public distrust.
        6y ago

With Sinopharm at 79% and astrazeneca at 70% we can probably get enough manufacturing (and combined with a first doses first policy like UK is doing) for solving covid in a matter of a few months

RL_Quine 6y ago
As long as they have no shared supply chain.
- athriren 6y ago
  the global medical raw material supply chain specifically for the kinds of chemicals needed for serological tests and the supply chain for equipment such as vials and racks are both incredibly fucked. the reason pfizer packaged its doses in larger than standard vials is because they literally could not procure the other kind in the volume needed and the time to retool the entire operation to load different sized vials only to unretool them wasnt worth the cost or time.
mbergal 6y ago
I understand that countries can license Sputnik V and produce it on their own equipment. Unless there is political pressure from US to not do that - https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2021-01-29/ukraine-bans-use-of-russian-vaccines https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2021-01-29/ukrain...
- The_rationalist 6y ago
  Wow this is a game changer

abraxas 6y ago

I know this is published in the Lancet but the data is coming purely from Russia. While it’s still a data point of sorts I think it’s really prudent for the rest of the world to try and reproduce these results before taking them at face value. Sorry but this data is coming from a totalitarian country where everything is directly or indirectly state controlled. I’m quite skeptical that the Kremlin didn’t put their thumb on the scales at least a little bit when compiling these results. Since this vaccine is being sold left and right around the developing world we might in due course obtain more independent data about it. Until then it’s safer to say that the efficacy of this vaccine is basically unknown.

Exmoor 6y ago
While I share your concerns about the government, and was suspicious of the numbers (heck, more than suspicious, I dismissed them out of hand), the more data that we see the more reasonable they seem. Using two different adenoviruses was, in retrospect, a pretty brilliant choice to increase the boost give by the second dose. I think it's entirely reasonable that this would give an additional 10-20% efficacy over other adenovirus vaccines. I don't pretend to know how involved the Russian government was in the process, but it's a shame the scientists who designed this vaccine are tainted by the corrupt government of the country they live in.
- abraxas 6y ago
  No question that Russia has some of the best minds in the world, still. But a big headline product like this would be incredibly tempting for the regime to exaggerate the efficacy of for propaganda reasons. That’s not to say the vaccine is not brilliant. It’s just that I’d say we still have insufficient evidence to assert that it is.
  - franklyt 6y ago
    The good money is on it being an exemplary vaccine. The Sputnik name and the glowing data we’ve heard about it. Besides, it’s not like you can trust big pharma only if has a Western brand slapped on it. Some of the worst drugs, possibly all of them (that I’m aware of), came from us.

doitLP 6y ago

I’m curious to see what the actual effectiveness (vs lab efficacy) is of all these vaccines. The gaps can be quite large.

The_rationalist 6y ago
Why would there be? It has been tested on 20000 persons from all age groups
eloff 6y ago
Why would you expect a large gap, that's not how statistics work. Any study of a sufficiently large population, like the phase 3 trials shouldn't vary much at all when scaled up to millions of participants. That's assuming the error bounds are small with the clinical trials, but I think that is universally the case here.
- Franciscouzo 6y ago
  If you take into account herd immunity the actual effectiveness should be >99%.
  - eloff 6y ago
    Yeah, that's a good point. Obviously vaccinations benefit from network effects as the number of vaccinated individuals in the population increases - so over time this will skew the results towards higher efficacy.
- doitLP 6y ago
  Efficacy describes what happens in a carefully controlled study. Vaccine efficacy is the percent reduction in disease incidence in a test group of vaccinated subjects compared to an unvaccinated group under optimal conditions. Such subjects usually do not have any underlying medical illnesses. Effectiveness describes what happens in the real world. Some tend to use ‘efficacy’ as if it is synonymous with the concept of ‘effectiveness’. This misuse is even rampant amongst doctors, who should know better. In fact, vaccine effectiveness is the ability of a vaccine to prevent outcomes of interest in the real world. For example, the influenza vaccine has been in use since 1938. It is spectacular at causing test subjects to make antibodies to the influenza virus. Now take a look at flu vaccine actual effectiveness (or lack thereof): There are universal recommendations to give flu vaccine to the elderly starting at age 65. A 2020 study [1] on the influenza vaccine in the UK compared outcomes when persons aged 65 to 75 got their yearly flu vaccines, compared to those of the same age who didn’t receive it. They were all followed for 4 years. The ones who got flu vaccine did not have any lower hospitalization rates or lower death rates (from all causes). This study showed that flu vaccine may be efficacious in controlled studies, but in real life it is often not effective in reducing death or hospitalizations – the outcomes of interest. [1] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32120383/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32120383/

boopmaster 6y ago

Hey guys, I’m mildly xenophobic and distrust people that are not from where I’m from. Can you help me out here because I’m pretty sure that we in America have contained this? I won't say airtight, but it's pretty close to airtight. Looking for national media that can cater to my overtly explicit biases and reinforce them in some kind of echo chamber. Thanks. /sarcasm

azinman2 6y ago

If this is true it’s great; the entire world needs to be inoculated for Covid to actually die out and not continue mutating year after year. Having an effective vaccine in Russia’s sphere of influence is a good thing.

ARandomerDude 6y ago

It's amazing and sad that so many comments in this thread are downvote grey. A controversial topic to say the least. To those downvoting the "I don't trust Russia" comments: step back and realize that this is HN and not Parler. If the HN crowd is this skeptical, how would something like this go over with the broader American/UK/EU/etc. public? My guess is not well. Trust but verify is probably the only realistic scenario if this vaccine is to be used in the West without a (larger) political storm.

mbergal 6y ago
We will see, joint AZ/Sputnik V trial is not causing any political storm yet: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-astrazeneca-russia/sputnik-astrazeneca-vaccine-trials-to-start-in-february-says-r-pharm-idUSKBN29O1BA https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-astraz...

klenwell 6y ago

I just happened to finish reading this recent New Yorker article about Sputnik V: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/02/08/the-sputnik-v-vaccine-and-russias-race-to-immunity https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/02/08/the-sputnik-v-... It covers the development of the vaccine as well as some of the controversy. After reading the article, I'd probably accept the vaccine if offered it. The author of the article did.

curiousllama 6y ago

If the vaccine is truly this effective, they’d release numbers like this. If the vaccine is completely useless or actively harmful, they’d release numbers like this. Very interested in reproduced results, but we have many vaccine leads in the West for now, so let’s invest in those.

corona-research 6y ago

Yeah, I am fully brain washed and I believe the mainstream narrative.

zoomablemind 6y ago

Why so much effort to sell that to the world? You've got a huge country with still very sizable population to protect against still very much active virus (plus the mutated versions). It works well without the Phase III? So be it. Isn't it about the very people of Russia? Now, they tell quantitatively that it has been just as good all along (wait, it's cheap too!). Well, even better - protect your people, maybe even start with the government. Russia is big!

sam_lowry_ 6y ago
Russian state has always been outward-looking and disrespectful of own population, and Putin is known to enjoy geopolitical games. Selling vaccine is a way to wield power. Unfortunately, Sputnik V is associated with Putin-the-Underpants-poisoner, 2014 Sochi Olympics, Civil war in Syria, Civil war in Ukraine, invasion of Crimea... and that association is not good.
- apexalpha 6y ago
  I doubt a lot of people would even get the vaccine, if it would be offered in my country. There is a deep mistrust towards the Russian government. And I think this goes for Russians themselves as well. Which is a shame because Russian science is quite good, despite their own government.
  - selivanovp 6y ago
    You’re driven by prejudices and propaganda. Russia vaccinates own population in mass now. I got my first shot two weeks ago and on Monday gonna get a second, for free.
    - sam_lowry_ 6y ago
      This is exactly it. Main reason there are no queues to get vaccinated in Russia is public distrust.
      - 6y ago