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The current HN title deviates from the original title in a way that is misleading. "Vaccines Are Effective Against Covid Variants" is a wrong affirmation. The o

The current HN title deviates from the original title in a way that is misleading. "Vaccines Are Effective Against Covid Variants" is a wrong affirmation. The original article only states that in vitro experiments show that some vaccines are effective against some variants. Not all vaccines, not all variants, and no test on human beings. A counter point is that some vaccines seem to be ineffective agains some variants. For instance AstraZeneca against B.A.351 (South-Africa). From a preprint: "Conclusions A two-dose regimen of ChAdOx1-nCoV19 did not show protection against mild-moderate Covid-19 due to B.1.351 variant, however, VE against severe Covid-19 is undetermined." https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.02.10.21251247v1 https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.02.10.21251247v... The US CDC does state that, according to current publications, some variants present a "moderate reduction on neutralization". Their page about "Variants of Interest" and "Variants of Concern" mentions many scientific papers. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/variant-surveillance/variant-info.html https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/vari...

dbetteridge 6y ago
I've posted this before regarding the SA paper on AZ, worth taking a look at the below. The probable outcome is minor to moderate symptoms that would normally be blocked by antibodies can still present (So no reduced transmission) but severe symptoms are still prevented by the vaccinated patients T-cells response. This paper is looking at a small scale human study in SA with mostly younger participants, which does make the results difficult to apply to the wider population. They also only use a 4 week dosing schedule where the suggestion and actual rollout in the UK is following the 10-12 week schedule between first and second doses which was shown to increase efficacy from ~70 to ~80% after the second dose (UK - Kent variant) The variant in question seems to escape the majority of Antibody detection, but T-Cells still seem to provide significant protection against severe disease and death. https://academic.oup.com/cid/advance-article/doi/10.1093/cid/ciab083/6124512 https://academic.oup.com/cid/advance-article/doi/10.1093/cid... https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.03.11.435000v1 https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.03.11.435000v1 The main published results aren't yet from human scale studies but here is one in hamsters showing a comparison in organ damage and results between unvaccinated and vaccinated with the Oxford/AZ vaccine.
dang 6y ago
Ok, we've reverted the title now. Submitted title was "Vaccines Are Effective Against Covid Variants". Submitters: please follow the site guidelines, which ask "Please use the original title, unless it is misleading or linkbait; don't editorialize." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

dbetteridge 6y ago

I've posted this before regarding the SA paper on AZ, worth taking a look at the below. The probable outcome is minor to moderate symptoms that would normally be blocked by antibodies can still present (So no reduced transmission) but severe symptoms are still prevented by the vaccinated patients T-cells response. This paper is looking at a small scale human study in SA with mostly younger participants, which does make the results difficult to apply to the wider population. They also only use a 4 week dosing schedule where the suggestion and actual rollout in the UK is following the 10-12 week schedule between first and second doses which was shown to increase efficacy from ~70 to ~80% after the second dose (UK - Kent variant) The variant in question seems to escape the majority of Antibody detection, but T-Cells still seem to provide significant protection against severe disease and death. https://academic.oup.com/cid/advance-article/doi/10.1093/cid/ciab083/6124512 https://academic.oup.com/cid/advance-article/doi/10.1093/cid... https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.03.11.435000v1 https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.03.11.435000v1 The main published results aren't yet from human scale studies but here is one in hamsters showing a comparison in organ damage and results between unvaccinated and vaccinated with the Oxford/AZ vaccine.

dang 6y ago

Ok, we've reverted the title now. Submitted title was "Vaccines Are Effective Against Covid Variants". Submitters: please follow the site guidelines, which ask "Please use the original title, unless it is misleading or linkbait; don't editorialize." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html