10 ms·

According to reports, the original BioNTech vaccine was developed in a matter of hours: https://www.businessinsider.com/pfizer-biontech-vaccine-designed-in-hour

by liber8 5y ago

According to reports, the original BioNTech vaccine was developed in a matter of hours: https://www.businessinsider.com/pfizer-biontech-vaccine-designed-in-hours-one-weekend-2020-12 https://www.businessinsider.com/pfizer-biontech-vaccine-desi... Moderna's was done in two days.

starik36 5y ago
Right, but the underlying tech was in development for a decade or more. I can deploy an app to Azure, tell it to allocate a server farm, databases, Redis, queues, etc... in 5 minutes too. But that's only because someone took years to do all the necessary work.
- johnisgood 5y ago
  > but the underlying tech was in development for a decade or more. By tech you mean mRNA vaccines? How did those studies go about it? Why was it not a thing before COVID-19?
  - barbazoo 5y ago
    Have a look at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MRNA_vaccine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MRNA_vaccine for an idea of a timeline going back to the 60s.
  - exegete 5y ago
    mRNA vaccines have been a thing in labs for a few decades and first human clinical trials against a pathogen in 2013 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/MRNA_vaccine https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/MRNA_vaccine
    - johnisgood 5y ago
      > Before 2020, no mRNA technology platform (drug or vaccine) had been authorized for use in humans, so there was a risk of unknown effects.[79] The 2020 COVID-19 pandemic required faster production capability of mRNA vaccines, made them attractive to national health organisations, and led to debate about the type of initial authorization mRNA vaccines should get (including emergency use authorization or expanded access authorization) after the eight-week period of post-final human trials. That risk of unknown effects was still there even when it got authorized for emergency use. Has it changed yet? Like... there was a vaccine based on old tech that has been used in humans for decades without side-effects that caused narcolepsy a year or two later, and we got lucky to have been able to make the association. It is not really only about what tech it uses, apparently.
      - epylar 5y ago
        Are you talking about Pandemrix? https://www.cdc.gov/vaccinesafety/concerns/history/narcolepsy-flu.html https://www.cdc.gov/vaccinesafety/concerns/history/narcoleps... says there was a lot of follow up on that and no link to narcolepsy was found
        deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
        johnisgood 5y ago
        About particularly that, Wikipedia says "In 2018, a multinational study including Centers for Disease Control and Prevention scientists published safety data on adjuvanted pH1N1 vaccines. Sweden was the only country where increased narcolepsy IRs were found in the period after vaccination campaigns. The ability of the researchers to evaluate the Pandremix brand vaccine was limited.", but you can read other ones as well here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pandemrix#Narcolepsy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pandemrix#Narcolepsy It is quite interesting.
      - nikolay 5y ago
        No vaccine would have been authorized on billions of people before 2020 if it had such prevalent incidence of peri- and myocarditis! But now it's authorized even of toddlers, which have even higher chance for future heart issues! And all this, because politicians didn't have the balls to keep the face mask mandates!
        johnisgood 5y ago
        And in comparison to COVID-19? Do they actually need a vaccine to protect against COVID-19? If not, are we giving it to them in the chance that it reduces spread, or why? It has been said it reduces spread, but this is not what you observe in countries that are >80% fully vaccinated (at least double dose), so I do not get it.
        cudgy 5y ago
- marco_yolo 5y ago
  why would you deploy an app to azure?
  - erhk 5y ago
    Probably because you paid them to let you.
  - throwaway984393 5y ago
    Leverage
- stjohnswarts 5y ago
  Sure but the delta amount of time is tiny compared to the 10 years to development so OP is correct as he never asserted that they were starting from scratch
vimy 5y ago
Which makes me wonder why it takes so long this time?
- data_dan_ 5y ago
  Testing and clinical trials!
  - vimy 5y ago
    We don’t do clinical trials for the yearly flu vaccine update, do we?
    - s1artibartfast 5y ago
      We also have 80 years of experience with the flu vaccine opposed to 8 months
      - SECProto 5y ago
        > We also have 80 years of experience with the flu vaccine opposed to 8 months 8 months is incorrect. Here's[1] an article from 17 months ago about results from Moderna's covid-19 trials for vaccinations dating back to mar16 2020. So it's been 21 months, not 8 (and that's ignoring trials of mRNA vaccines years earlier as they weren't for this specific virus) [1] https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-perspective/2020/07/hopeful-results-phase-1-moderna-covid-vaccine-trial https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-perspective/2020/07/hopeful-...
        s1artibartfast 5y ago
        We can split hairs on what constitutes experience, or when it starts. but the point still stands: We have a lot more experience with the flu vaccine. This is the answer for why not all annual flu vaccines need clinical trials.
        ashildr 5y ago

by liber8 5y ago

starik36 5y ago

Right, but the underlying tech was in development for a decade or more. I can deploy an app to Azure, tell it to allocate a server farm, databases, Redis, queues, etc... in 5 minutes too. But that's only because someone took years to do all the necessary work.

johnisgood 5y ago
> but the underlying tech was in development for a decade or more. By tech you mean mRNA vaccines? How did those studies go about it? Why was it not a thing before COVID-19?
- barbazoo 5y ago
  Have a look at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MRNA_vaccine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MRNA_vaccine for an idea of a timeline going back to the 60s.
- exegete 5y ago
  mRNA vaccines have been a thing in labs for a few decades and first human clinical trials against a pathogen in 2013 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/MRNA_vaccine https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/MRNA_vaccine
  - johnisgood 5y ago
    > Before 2020, no mRNA technology platform (drug or vaccine) had been authorized for use in humans, so there was a risk of unknown effects.[79] The 2020 COVID-19 pandemic required faster production capability of mRNA vaccines, made them attractive to national health organisations, and led to debate about the type of initial authorization mRNA vaccines should get (including emergency use authorization or expanded access authorization) after the eight-week period of post-final human trials. That risk of unknown effects was still there even when it got authorized for emergency use. Has it changed yet? Like... there was a vaccine based on old tech that has been used in humans for decades without side-effects that caused narcolepsy a year or two later, and we got lucky to have been able to make the association. It is not really only about what tech it uses, apparently.
    - epylar 5y ago
      Are you talking about Pandemrix? https://www.cdc.gov/vaccinesafety/concerns/history/narcolepsy-flu.html https://www.cdc.gov/vaccinesafety/concerns/history/narcoleps... says there was a lot of follow up on that and no link to narcolepsy was found
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
      - johnisgood 5y ago
        About particularly that, Wikipedia says "In 2018, a multinational study including Centers for Disease Control and Prevention scientists published safety data on adjuvanted pH1N1 vaccines. Sweden was the only country where increased narcolepsy IRs were found in the period after vaccination campaigns. The ability of the researchers to evaluate the Pandremix brand vaccine was limited.", but you can read other ones as well here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pandemrix#Narcolepsy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pandemrix#Narcolepsy It is quite interesting.
    - nikolay 5y ago
      No vaccine would have been authorized on billions of people before 2020 if it had such prevalent incidence of peri- and myocarditis! But now it's authorized even of toddlers, which have even higher chance for future heart issues! And all this, because politicians didn't have the balls to keep the face mask mandates!
      - johnisgood 5y ago
        And in comparison to COVID-19? Do they actually need a vaccine to protect against COVID-19? If not, are we giving it to them in the chance that it reduces spread, or why? It has been said it reduces spread, but this is not what you observe in countries that are >80% fully vaccinated (at least double dose), so I do not get it.
        cudgy 5y ago
marco_yolo 5y ago
why would you deploy an app to azure?
- erhk 5y ago
  Probably because you paid them to let you.
- throwaway984393 5y ago
  Leverage
stjohnswarts 5y ago
Sure but the delta amount of time is tiny compared to the 10 years to development so OP is correct as he never asserted that they were starting from scratch

vimy 5y ago

Which makes me wonder why it takes so long this time?

data_dan_ 5y ago
Testing and clinical trials!
- vimy 5y ago
  We don’t do clinical trials for the yearly flu vaccine update, do we?
  - s1artibartfast 5y ago
    We also have 80 years of experience with the flu vaccine opposed to 8 months
    - SECProto 5y ago
      > We also have 80 years of experience with the flu vaccine opposed to 8 months 8 months is incorrect. Here's[1] an article from 17 months ago about results from Moderna's covid-19 trials for vaccinations dating back to mar16 2020. So it's been 21 months, not 8 (and that's ignoring trials of mRNA vaccines years earlier as they weren't for this specific virus) [1] https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-perspective/2020/07/hopeful-results-phase-1-moderna-covid-vaccine-trial https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-perspective/2020/07/hopeful-...
      - s1artibartfast 5y ago
        We can split hairs on what constitutes experience, or when it starts. but the point still stands: We have a lot more experience with the flu vaccine. This is the answer for why not all annual flu vaccines need clinical trials.
        ashildr 5y ago