3 ms·

its kinda impressive all the technologies DARPA/DOD has funded...would be interesting to see the fail/win rate for them.

by jti107 5y ago

lrem 5y ago
Non-zero is all you need in this case, isn't it? :)
- jonplackett 5y ago
  I wonder if it’s possible to calculate a rate of return on that. How much worse off would we be now without mRNA vaccines? I doubt anyone would be complaining about blood clots.
  - shigawire 5y ago
    Seems like China did fine with more conventional vaccine technologies. I'm glad we have another tool in the toolbox, but I am missing why the mRNA vaccine tech was necessary for COVID.
    - JumpCrisscross 5y ago
      > China did fine with more conventional vaccine technologies China's Covid vaccine is far less effective than the mRNA vaccines, a fact that's been recognized by its own leaders [1]. It's also less extensible--we have covered most of the parameter space conventional methods offer. A new platform allows us to target e.g. HIV anew [2]. [1]https://www.bmj.com/content/373/bmj.n969 https://www.bmj.com/content/373/bmj.n969 [2] https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/medical/moderna-is-working-on-an-hiv-vaccine-after-its-covid-19-success/ar-BB1cFaWK https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/medical/moderna-is-working-...
    - ls612 5y ago
      The chinese vaccines are mostly inactivated coronavirus vaccines and are only 50-60% effective. We are seeing countries which relied heavily on them such as Chile and the Seychelles having large and sustained outbreaks because they aren't effective enough to stop the spread. They probably do fairly well against mortality though. I'd say we would be in an incredibly worse position if we only had J&J and Astrazeneca in the west. In the US the pandemic is over now and we have only vaccinated about half of people with the mRNA shots. I strongly doubt we would be normal again now if we had not had those.
    - jonplackett 5y ago
      I think if we still had AstraZeneca we would not be in an awful position - but that vaccine already had a massive supply constraint - the EU is still pretty pissed about that. So if there were no other vaccines that would be worse for starters. Also, as others have pointed out, it’s more effective. Correct me if I’m wrong about this but it seems to be deceptive to think about it in terms of effectiveness. 60% doesn’t seem that much worse than 95%. Feels like 2/3 as good. But if you look at it the other way around it’s 40% vs 5% which makes the gap much clearer - 8X more people getting symptoms (not sure what the data is on hospitalisation / deaths is though, probably closer) Plus I believe mRNA vaccines should end up being cheaper in the long run. Oh and plus you don’t feel as bad after getting them.

its kinda impressive all the technologies DARPA/DOD has funded...would be interesting to see the fail/win rate for them.

by jti107 5y ago

its kinda impressive all the technologies DARPA/DOD has funded...would be interesting to see the fail/win rate for them.

lrem 5y ago

Non-zero is all you need in this case, isn't it? :)

jonplackett 5y ago
I wonder if it’s possible to calculate a rate of return on that. How much worse off would we be now without mRNA vaccines? I doubt anyone would be complaining about blood clots.
- shigawire 5y ago
  Seems like China did fine with more conventional vaccine technologies. I'm glad we have another tool in the toolbox, but I am missing why the mRNA vaccine tech was necessary for COVID.
  - JumpCrisscross 5y ago
    > China did fine with more conventional vaccine technologies China's Covid vaccine is far less effective than the mRNA vaccines, a fact that's been recognized by its own leaders [1]. It's also less extensible--we have covered most of the parameter space conventional methods offer. A new platform allows us to target e.g. HIV anew [2]. [1]https://www.bmj.com/content/373/bmj.n969 https://www.bmj.com/content/373/bmj.n969 [2] https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/medical/moderna-is-working-on-an-hiv-vaccine-after-its-covid-19-success/ar-BB1cFaWK https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/medical/moderna-is-working-...
  - ls612 5y ago
    The chinese vaccines are mostly inactivated coronavirus vaccines and are only 50-60% effective. We are seeing countries which relied heavily on them such as Chile and the Seychelles having large and sustained outbreaks because they aren't effective enough to stop the spread. They probably do fairly well against mortality though. I'd say we would be in an incredibly worse position if we only had J&J and Astrazeneca in the west. In the US the pandemic is over now and we have only vaccinated about half of people with the mRNA shots. I strongly doubt we would be normal again now if we had not had those.
  - jonplackett 5y ago
    I think if we still had AstraZeneca we would not be in an awful position - but that vaccine already had a massive supply constraint - the EU is still pretty pissed about that. So if there were no other vaccines that would be worse for starters. Also, as others have pointed out, it’s more effective. Correct me if I’m wrong about this but it seems to be deceptive to think about it in terms of effectiveness. 60% doesn’t seem that much worse than 95%. Feels like 2/3 as good. But if you look at it the other way around it’s 40% vs 5% which makes the gap much clearer - 8X more people getting symptoms (not sure what the data is on hospitalisation / deaths is though, probably closer) Plus I believe mRNA vaccines should end up being cheaper in the long run. Oh and plus you don’t feel as bad after getting them.