5 ms·
It's been over 50 years since the thalidomide tragedy. Do you still let plane crashes of last century direct your choice of transportation?
by nickpp 6y ago
It's been over 50 years since the thalidomide tragedy. Do you still let plane crashes of last century direct your choice of transportation?
- jedberg 6y agoThe point is the USA was right when everyone else was wrong and didn't bow to public pressure, and so I trust them a bit more when they are conservative with approvals.
- nickpp 6y agoYes it was right in that case, but blindly letting a single tragedy direct policy without taking into consideration current factors is extremely dangerous. People are dying of COVID right now. If fear of another thalidomide incident delays a saving vaccine we may end up losing more lives than potentially saving.
- jedberg 6y agoIt's not blindly letting a single tragedy set policy. It's one example of many that the FDA has used to build up trust in their process over the last eight decades. And it's not like the AZ vax is the only option out there. The lives will still be saved with the other vaccines.
- nickpp 6y agoI don't know any of the other "many examples", the only one I keep hearing about is the thalidomide incident. Kind of like when people opposing nuclear power keep bringing up Chernobyl and Fukushima while ignoring their relative tiny victim count compared to the millions of people killed by our fossil energy production.
- jedberg 6y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lumiracoxib https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lumiracoxib -- Approved in Europe, not the USA. Withdrawn from sales due to side effects. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zimelidine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zimelidine -- Same. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tolrestat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tolrestat -- Approved in Europe, failed stage 3 clinical in the USA https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rimonabant https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rimonabant -- Approved in Europe, failed in the USA, withdrawn worldwide because the side effects were so bad. Thalidomide is just the most famous because it was the most disastrous, but there are plenty of others. Like I said, the FDA has a strong many decades track record. This is nothing like opposing nuclear plants.
- nickpp 6y agoOK, but if any of those was actually saving lives I'd argue it should've been approved, side effects be damned. Last time I looked, thousands of people were dying every day of Covid. Ignoring those just in case a vaccine is harmful is, IMHO, a bad tradeoff and I don't trust the people making it in my name. I prefer, in life-or-death situations, making my own (informed) decisions.
- jedberg 6y agoIf the AZ drug were the only COVID vax available, I might agree with you. But there are already two others and a third on a the way, all of which are more effective than the AZ drug. And the USA has already negotiated to get more of the approved ones than the UK is getting on a per capita basis. Allowing a drug you know doesn't work well is a great way to break the public trust, especially when there are plenty of alternatives.
- nickpp 6y agoYou'd be quite right if we had plenty of mRNA vaccines available, but, if I'm not mistaken, we are supply constrained and we'll be for at least a couple more months. Months in which people are dying, people who could be saved by the AZ vaccine, of course at some risk - but which is very much preferable to death, I'd say.
- wpietri 6y agoPlane crashes of the last century deeply inform regulation of planes this century. It's why we have so few plane crashes despite massive increases in passenger-miles flown.
- nickpp 6y agoI strongly doubt the planes of today present the vulnerabilities of last century. Those lessons were leant and applied. Today's airplanes have different issues and policy should better be about the current issues (and crashes) otherwise it would be outdated and obsolete. But my analogy was about recommending flying or not flying: you should base that recommendation on the safety of today's airplanes, not on the crashes of the past (even if those crashes enabled the current safety level).
- prh8 6y agoHis point was the regulation of planes, not the planes themselves. Which is effectively what forms the "safety of today's planes" that you are looking for.