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I think this is the correct analysis - the focus should be to provide vaccines to the rest of the worlds nations that have not yet gotten widespread access to v
by occz 5y ago
I think this is the correct analysis - the focus should be to provide vaccines to the rest of the worlds nations that have not yet gotten widespread access to vaccines. This is likely to cause the greatest benefit in the form of fewer global deaths, and reduced global spread of the disease.
- skrebbel 5y agoAnd, for a selfish western pitch: reduce the chance that bad new variants develop.
- swader999 5y agoHow will these vaccines that don't produce immunity lead to less severe variants? If they mute severity of illness they will lead to more severe variants. This is basic.
- dtech 5y agoThey do provide immunity in 95% (conservative) of cases, so it massively reduces the population that mutations can happen in.
- swader999 5y agoThey reduce severity of illness, and don't produce sterilizing immunity and eliminate transmission. And that's the problem, if you pick up a nasty mutation but because of vaccine you are able to still function, you are more likely to be out and about spreading it. And when your limited immunity wanes in a few months this mutinous bastard copy you pushed on the masses may come back to bite you in the ass. Maybe not though if you got your booster in time and if they designed it to match. Better hope your country went with the gold subscription.
- technothrasher 5y agoWhat data are you referencing to claim that the vaccines do not provide some immunity? But importantly, the vaccines do reduce transmission. See the below study along with others. https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMc2107717 https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMc2107717 Admittedly, one weakness of the above study is that it took place before Delta was widespread. There isn't a lot of data yet on how much the vaccines reduce transmission with Delta, but the likelihood is that they still do even if to a lesser degree.
- swader999 5y agoReducing transmission isn't good enough! If you have an R naught above one you're still in trouble. It's common knowledge that countries with highest vaccination rates have spikes in cases right now. Israel and Gibraltar for example. Herd immunity for this was always impossible.
- fabian2k 5y agoIsrael isn't among the countries with the highest vaccination rates anymore, quite a few other countries have overtaken it.
- swader999 5y agoOk well you can't beat Gibraltar at 99%. But you look at other countries. New Zealand is a good one. Their hospitals are getting swamped with kids right now with severe RSV. Why? They've had their immune systems degraded from some of the most severe lockdowns I the planet. And admittedly they aren't in a covid spike but the effective lockdown has created other problems.
- nradov 5y agoThis shouldn't be down voted. It appears to be correct and is a subject of active concern in NZ. https://www.auckland.ac.nz/en/news/2021/08/02/fight-against-rsv-flu.html https://www.auckland.ac.nz/en/news/2021/08/02/fight-against-...
- meragrin_ 5y ago> They do provide immunity in 95% (conservative) of cases So not conservative. Real world data has all of them at under 80% now. https://www.yalemedicine.org/news/covid-19-vaccine-comparison https://www.yalemedicine.org/news/covid-19-vaccine-compariso...
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- orwin 5y agoI heard against the Delta variant, RNA vaccines help divide the chance of contaminating others by at least two, even if you're asymptomatic (because basically, the virus last half the tine in your body). And also, since you're contaminated for less time, there is fewer chance of a variant popping out of a vaccinated person. Take it as someone who heard someone talk about it, did not research himself (because i don't really care) and isn't really sure of what the truth is. See this comment as a clue if this stuff interest you.
- shucksley 5y agoHalving is not good enough when the infectivity is very high. The Vietnam study showed that 49/69 "trained doctors and nurses" gave the virus to each other despite being vaccinated. God only knows how many patients they infected. see https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3897733 https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3897733 for details. (But this is HN, and I will be downvoted into oblivion. Carry on folks. Keep ignoring the data.)
- Tepix 5y agoYou are not protected againts new mutations just because they originate from another place in the world. You are not reducing the chances for new mutations. Keeping the vaccine to yourself will not help you.
- ericb 5y agoI think you're misunderstanding the intent of the parent post. They are saying letting vaccines go to the rest of the world is still the right course of action even if your motives were purely selfish. By reducing the number of infections elsewhere, the virus has fewer chances to mutate and return to and endanger you.
- emn13 5y agoWhile in principle that's clearly sound - fewer viral particles means fewer future variants appears to be the consensus opinion - I'm skeptical that the decision to recommend boosters after 8 months will have a measurable impact on that. First of all, even under rosy vaccine acceptance trajectories that's not going to be many doses vs. the unvaccinated population; secondly, you need 1 dose for a booster, yet 2 for a full vaccination; thirdly, the data for hospitalisations may not be in, but for mere infections it is clearly showing a reduction in efficacy well before a that 8 month mininum so the opportunity cost of not vaccinating half a person will be offset in terms of transmission by the booster dose; fourthly not all vaccines are easily distributed, and as long as the US needs to have a readily available supply to entice the unvaccinated stragglers, you might as well use doses nearing expiration dates for boosters rather than throwing them away; fifth: we're not at 8 months yet for most people, and if the minimum delay is 8 months the average might be considerably more such that by the time this matters vaccine production should be higher and thus the loss relatively less impactful. Some of those effects might be trivial or zero, but at the very least the small number of doses overall affected probably isn't. I'd be really surprised if the US reaches 100 million booster doses by next spring; and even if we did that's just not a huge number if your aim is to reduce transmission (as opposed to suffering).
- gitanovic 5y agoI think he is stating the exact opposite: to actually give doses to those countries without, exactly for this reason
- gitanovic 5y agoWas going to answer to say exactly this. The more vaccinated, the merrier the world with less variants
- mythrwy 5y agoWhat if it works the opposite though? Simple evolutionary biology suggests resistance develops from roadblocks or mechanisms to stifle. We see it all the time in antibiotic resistance, resistance of insects to pesticides used in crops, all kinds of areas. I don't see a reason this case would be different.
- gitanovic 5y agobecause you are giving the virus less chances to replicate and therefore less chances at mutation I might be wrong, but it seems obvious to me that this should reduce variants
- hef19898 5y agoBut developing countries pay less, so BionTech and Pfizer will have less profits. As cool as having a company like Biontech, run by immigrants, founded in Germany they always rubbed me the wrong way in terms of PR and business conduct since the start of the pandemic. With huge support from German media and politics. The continued dissing of Astrazeneca is just one example, the push for booster shots is another.
- ctrlp 5y agoIt's fascinating how the vaccine makers have come out of this smelling like roses to so many and I wonder how long it will last. Not long ago, the NYT could write "the turpitude of the pharmaceutical industry is so commonplace that it has become part of the cultural wallpaper.” [0] Now we all seem very happy to accept their products and believe their claims. Truly wonderful to behold. I can recall books and arguments that made a good case that big pharma operates most like a mafia. I also recall hearing some tthatime ago that drug pharma execs themselves consider the vaccine guys to be like the mob, with a habit of aggressive shakedowns and pressure campaigns the norm in that industry, and thought they gave the industry a bad name.
- ctrlp 5y agoCitation https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/17/opinion/covid-vaccine-big-pharma.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/17/opinion/covid-vaccine-big...
- hef19898 5y agoYeah, and the one company that did the right thing (TM), AZ, by selling the vaccine at cost is the one who's image suffered the most. Strange times we live in.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- refurb 5y agoWell, I'm assuming people were more critical before covid because it's easy to thrown stones when there isn't an epidemic going on a millions dying?
- raesene9 5y agoI'd agree in the ideal world that's exactly what should happen, however in reality there are a load of unadministered doses in the US (https://twitter.com/EricTopol/status/1437617018782449668?s=20 https://twitter.com/EricTopol/status/1437617018782449668?s=2...) which will go to waste if not used, so it would seem to make sense to use those for boosters where they're available.
- est31 5y agoWhat about sending the unused doses to developing countries? Then they wouldn't go to waste.
- raesene9 5y agoyeah ideally that should happen :) Just it hasn't so the choice isn't "use locally or send abroad" it's "use locally or let them go to waste" TBF I guess this must be a really complex logistical challenge.
- hef19898 5y agoNot sure about logistics, so. Sure it i challenging, but there are well established vaccination programms run by expierenced NOGs in developing countries already. These folks would, I guess, be really happy to take those doses and set something up. They are also rather capable of doing so. initially, that was part of the EUs over-ordering. Take those doses and give them to poorer countries. Good for public health, good PR and really good at gaining soft power in the world. No idea why that isn't happening. Russia and China are grateful for that I guess, so.
- dalyons 5y agoI read that it wasn’t the logistics of sending them out that’s challenging; rather it’s trying to collect them back from the 100k+ pharmacies, hospitals, distribution sites etc in the US, most with poor records. The us mounted such a large and effective campaign to get them out there, would take just almost as large an effort to bring them back
- hellbannedguy 5y agoIf they can keep the Moderna, and Pfizer vaccine, at below freeing? I just picture America the "great" delivering vaccines, and there's no infrastructure on the other end. On a selfish note, I wouldn't mind closing all ports of entry until this virus is truly under control.
- SamoyedFurFluff 5y agoI don’t understand what closing all ports of entry will do (in USA) at this point. The virus is already here and all travel to USA requires a negative covid test taken at most 72 hrs before flight.
- ctrlp 5y agoGood luck closing the U.S. southern border.
- Robotbeat 5y agoThat’s not really the concern. Foot travel is ridiculously slow. This virus travels by air, first class.
- ctrlp 5y agoPeople board buses and planes once they cross the border.
- Robotbeat 5y agoNot likely planes. The most mobile people are the richest.
- ctrlp 5y agoIt's not expensive if you're not paying for it. Immigration administration flies people from the border to the interior for processing and release.[0] "U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which turns over border crossers to ICE after arresting them, has begun flying migrants to other cities for processing and is releasing them directly into communities without going through ICE, saying their own facilities are at capacity." [1] [0] https://www.expressnews.com/news/local/article/ICE-says-780-undocumented-immigrants-flown-out-of-16320451.php https://www.expressnews.com/news/local/article/ICE-says-780-... [1] https://apnews.com/article/us-news-ap-top-news-mi-state-wire-az-state-wire-immigration-1c7aec8b18ae4cb3a8ed0a624c641eb9 https://apnews.com/article/us-news-ap-top-news-mi-state-wire...
- Robotbeat 5y agoBut we do not have a limited number of vaccines. At this point there has been plenty of time supply chains to produce the necessary precursors so we are limited entirely by demand. If we are distributing extra vaccines to other countries it is because we don’t want to not because we can’t or because we’re fighting over a single scarce resource. There is no evidence that we have to choose between boosters or sending vaccines to other countries. This is the same flawed logic that officials made when they spread doubt about the effectiveness of masks early in the pandemic, hoping to “conserve” masks for healthcare workers. The assumption of vaccine scarcity is actually a hidden assumption made outside the expertise of those who aren’t deeply knowledgeable about vaccine supply chains.