Coronavirus 2019-2020 thread (no unsubstantiated rumours!)

KYli

Brigadier
One thing I've found strange is the how Phase 3 trials are touted as the end of testing and ready to roll out to billions.
For example: Pfizer announcing 1.3 Billion does for 2021.

Phase 3 trials involve less than 50000 people and it's been less than 2 months since any vaccine has started their tests.

Yet we've seen previously that it can take a sample size of millions AND years for a side effect to show.

So jumping straight from a Phase 3 trial to mass vaccination of billions seems irresponsible.

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In comparison, Sinopharm is also in the middle of conducting Phase 3 trials.
Plus it has concurrently been running what you could call Phase 4 testing, with 1 million vaccinations so far.
That increase the sample size substantially AND the overall timeline to detect any longer-term side effects.

That is important once you start talking about the risk of vaccinating billions.

So arguably the Sinopharm approach is better, if you have no choice but to start vaccinating billions immediately.

So despite criticism of the Sinopharm vaccine being given to 1 million people so far, it actually is a better and safer approach.

To be fair, if Pfizer and Moderna rollout their vaccines slowly, then it is still scientifically sound. However, it looks like the vaccinations would be rushed out to everyone as fast as possible.
 

Hendrik_2000

Lieutenant General
Freedom mean different thing for different people In China freedom mean freedom from hunger and want, freedom from cold and rain. freedom from disease and catastrophe illness good article
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China beat the coronavirus with science and strong public health measures, not just with authoritarianism

Elanah Uretsky, Associate Professor of International and Global Studies, Brandeis University
Mon, November 23, 2020, 7:20 AM CST


<span class=caption>One of the Wuhan train stations in fall 2020. The city reopened in April 2020 after a total shutdown.</span> <span class=attribution><span class=source>Liu Yan</span>, <a class=link rapid-noclick-resp href=http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/ rel=nofollow noopener target=_blank data-ylk=slk:CC BY-SA>CC BY-SA</a></span>

One of the Wuhan train stations in fall 2020. The city reopened in April 2020 after a total shutdown. Liu Yan,
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I live in a democracy. But as Thanksgiving approaches, I find myself longing for the type of freedom I am seeing in China.
People in China are able to move around freely right now. Many Americans may believe that the Chinese are able to
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because of China’s authoritarian regime. As a
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, I think the answers go beyond that.
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suggests that the control of the virus in China is not the result of authoritarian policy, but of a national prioritization of health. China learned a tough lesson with
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, the first coronavirus
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of the 21st century.

How China flattened its curve
Barely less than a year ago, a novel coronavirus emerged in Wuhan, China, with 80,000 cases identified within three months,
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.
In late January 2020, the Chinese government decided to lock down this city of 11 million people. All transportation to and from the city was stopped. Officials further locked down several other cities in Hubei Province, eventually quarantining over 50 million people.
By the beginning of April, the Chinese government limited the spread of the virus to the point where they felt comfortable
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.

Seven months later, China has confirmed
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and recorded 1,407 more deaths due to the coronavirus. People in China travel, eat in restaurants and go into theaters, and kids go to school
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. Juxtapose that to what we are experiencing in the U.S. To date, we have confirmed over
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, with the last 1 million recorded in
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.
In September and October, friends from China sent me pictures of food from all over the country as they traveled around to visit friends and family for the mid-autumn festival and then the seven-day National Day vacation week. I envied them then and envy them even more now as Americans prepare and wonder how we will celebrate Thanksgiving this year.

What China learned from SARS
We Americans are told that the freedoms Chinese now enjoy come at the expense of being subject to a set of draconian public health policies that can be instituted only by an
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. But they also have the experience of living through a similar epidemic.
SARS broke out in November of 2002 and ended in May of 2003, and China was anything but prepared for its emergence. It didn’t have the
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in place to detect or control such a disease, and initially decided to prioritize politics and economy over health by
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. This didn’t work with such a virulent disease that started spreading around the world.

After being forced to come to terms with SARS, China’s leaders eventually did enforce quarantine in Beijing and canceled the week-long May Day holiday of 2003. This helped to end the pandemic within a few short months, with minimal impact. SARS infected approximately
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, 65% of which occurred in China and Hong Kong.

The Chinese government learned from SARS the important role public health plays in protecting the nation. Following SARS, the government improved training of public health professionals and developed one of the most
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. While caught off guard for this next big coronavirus outbreak in December 2019, the country quickly mobilized its resources to bring the epidemic almost to a halt inside its borders within three months.
What can the US learn from China?
Knowing that there were no safe or proven treatments or an effective vaccine, China relied on proven nonpharmaceutical interventions to conquer the epidemic. First and foremost was
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the virus through controlling the sources of infection and blocking transmission. This was accomplished through early detection (testing), isolation, treatment and tracing the close contacts of any infected individual.

This strategy was aided by the three
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(fancang) the government built to isolate patients with mild to moderate symptoms from their families. Strict
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measures were also central to preventing the spread of this epidemic, as it was with the SARS epidemic in 2003. This was
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compulsory mask-wearing, promotion of personal hygiene (hand-washing, home disinfection, ventilation), self-monitoring of body temperature, universal compulsory stay-at-home orders for all residents, and universal symptom surveys conducted by community workers and volunteers.
 

hashtagpls

Senior Member
Registered Member
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Doctors in the free and democratic US are striking now due to insufficient PPE; apparently in the free and democratic US, the State doesn't even have to bother providing you with adequate protection and ensure that your family gets taken care of, like in China.

During the worst days fo Wuhan, the Central Government made sure the COVID treating doctors and nurses were isolated in their own seperate living facilities away from their homes and were paid handsomely for their heroism. We are not seeing anywhere near the same in the free and democratic huwhite glorious empire of the anglos.
 

AndrewS

Brigadier
Registered Member
To be fair, if Pfizer and Moderna rollout their vaccines slowly, then it is still scientifically sound. However, it looks like the vaccinations would be rushed out to everyone as fast as possible.

@vesicles

Pfizer and Moderna actually have a choice as to whether they rollout their vaccines quickly or slowly.

But their premature press releases are designed to get as many customers as quickly as possible, and at as high a price as possible.

And if I analyse the situation further:

1. The number of trained healthcare professionals (who can administer vaccination shots) is limited.
2. The Moderna/Pfizer mRNA vaccines also have to be kept deep frozen which is a logistical nightmare.
3. In comparison, the adenovirus and inactivated vaccine front runners only need to be refrigerated.

What this means is that each Moderna/Pfizer mRNA vaccination will take a longer time for each medic to perform.
So when more Moderna/Pfizer vaccines are used, it slows down the overall vaccination effort.

Given that additional time = additional deaths, I think Moderna/Pfizer are acting in almost in a criminal manner by prematurely pushing their vaccines now
 

timepass

Brigadier
World Economic Forum to mark Pakistan's 'massive' Covid-19 'success' on Wednesday: Report

The World Economic Forum (WEF) has reportedly announced that Wednesday, November 25 will be 'Pakistan Strategy Day' in recognition of the country's 'successful policies against Covid-19', with Prime Minister Imran Khan the chief guest at the event.

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KYli

Brigadier
We should know Sinovac vaccine efficiency results in the first week of December, and China's health regulator could have approved it in Dec. Sinopharm vaccine efficency results are just days away. So if everything goes according to plan, China should have 2 vaccines ready in Dec. However, China might not rollout a national vaccination program as of now due to the low infection rate.

Brazil has enough infection data to analyze Sinovac's COVID-19 vaccine - officials
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SAO PAULO (Reuters) - Brazil has gathered enough infection data from a late-stage trial of an experimental COVID-19 vaccine developed by China’s Sinovac Biotech and expects to have interim results on its efficiency in early December, trial organizers said on Monday.

Dimas Covas, director of Butantan biomedical research institute that is running the late-stage trial of the Sinovac vaccine in Brazil, said it now has 74 confirmed cases among its trial participants, above the 61 initial milestone set for interim efficiency analysis.

He said an independent committee is likely to release the efficiency results in the first week of December based on its analysis of the data.


The news comes as Britain’s AstraZeneca Plc on Monday joined its U.S. rivals Pfizer and Moderna and Russia in announcing positive results in pivotal trials, raising hopes that the world would soon have successful vaccines to end the pandemic.

Covas said Brazil’s health ministry now has all the information needed to include Coronavac in the national program, while São Paulo Health Secretary Jean Gorinchteyn expected on Monday Brazil’s regulator to approve the use of the Sinovac vaccine, CoronaVac, by January.

João Gabbardo, head of the Sao Paulo’s COVID-19 contingency committee, said at the same event that he expects China’s health regulator to approve Sinovac’s CoronaVac in December, which could hasten approval in Brazil.


The Sinovac vaccine has been promoted by Sao Paulo Governor João Doria, a move which has put him at odds with President Jair Bolsonaro who is a vocal China skeptic.

Bolsonaro has attacked the Chinese vaccine for lacking credibility and it remains unclear whether the federal government will include it in its national inoculation program.

The ministry said on Sunday it planned to sign non-binding letters of intent to buy vaccines from Pfizer Inc, India’s Bharat Biotech, the Russian Direct Investment Fund, Moderna Inc and Janssen, a unit of Johnson & Johnson, but made no mention of Sinovac’s candidate.
 

KYli

Brigadier
If Oxford vaccine can claim 90% efficacy rate without being scrutinized, then other not western vaccines can also manipulate and twist data to hype its efficacy and downplay any adverse effects. It is a fair game. But for the sake of the world, hope every vaccines work out fine with minimal side effects.

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Russia says data on Sputnik Covid vaccine shows 95% efficacy

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has said that its coronavirus vaccine has more than 95% efficacy according to new preliminary data, giving it a success rate comparable to vaccines being developed by Pfizer and Moderna.

Russian officials
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their vaccine had greater efficacy than the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine because of Russia’s proprietary technology, which it offered to share with British scientists.

The preliminary results were released as competition heats up among vaccine developers to mass produce a coronavirus jab and help bring the pandemic to an end.

While numerous countries have expressed an interest in studying or purchasing the vaccine, few western countries have signed up. Among EU nations, only Hungary has expressed a serious interest, causing friction with other members of the bloc. A spokesman for the European commission said the body “does not have any data regarding this Russian vaccine,” Interfax reported on Tuesday evening


Not everyone is convinced by Russia’s official data, however, and suspicions have been increased by the fact Russian authorities speedily licensed the vaccine before the results of stage three trials were available, as well as reports of state employees being coerced into taking part in trials.


The Sputnik results were computed after 42 days of a study in which 19,000 participants received two doses of the vaccine and 21,000 participants received a single dose. Earlier data showed that the vaccine had an approximately 91.4% efficacy 28 days after participants received the first dose.


Top officials, including Dmitriev, claim to have taken the vaccine and have said they feel fine. The Kremlin said on Monday that Vladimir Putin had not had a coronavirus jab, with a spokesman saying that the president could not take part in a medical trial.


“After all, the president can’t use an uncertified vaccine,” said Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin spokesman.


A successful vaccine is Russia’s key to emerging from the Covid-19 pandemic, which has infected more than 2.15 million people in the country and is currently spreading at a record pace. Vladimir Putin and many regional heads have been hesitant to introduce a broad lockdown similar to earlier this year out of concern for the harm to the country’s economy.


The Russian prime minister Mikhail Mishustin said that the country’s priority was for Russians to have access to the vaccine. “Every person in every region in the country should have the possibility to be vaccinated against the disease,” he said, adding that: “Nobody is going to be forced to do this.”


But the vaccine’s development at Russia’s Gamaleya research institute has also been driven by the economic allure of selling it abroad and national pride in the country’s scientific prowess that has earned comparisons to the cold war space race, when the Soviet Unions’s Sputnik 1 was the world’s first satellite to be launched into orbit around the Earth.


Dmitriev, who has been tasked with selling the vaccine abroad, said that a dose of the vaccine would cost no more than $10 (£7.50) on international markets – about half the cost of the Pfizer vaccine.
He predicted that more than 1bn doses would be produced in the next year in countries including India, Korea, Brazil, China, and Hungary, the first, and so far the only, EU country to express a serious interest in the Russian vaccine.

Ten sample batches arrived in Budapest on a temperature-controlled flight last week.

Hungary’s prime minister, Viktor Orbán, who is currently in dispute with other European leaders over plans to link EU budget funds to rule of law criteria, has been criticised in the past for his friendly relations with the Kremlin.

The Hungarian government said it has made preliminary orders for a number of different vaccines, including those manufactured in Russia and China, and Orbán has promised that individual citizens would be able to choose which vaccine to take.

“As vaccination will not be compulsory, if there are several vaccines, everyone will be able to decide for themselves which one they trust most: whether they prefer the business-centred approach of a US corporation, the state-developed Russian vaccine, or the Chinese one,” he said.

Hungary’s foreign minister Péter Szijjártó said Hungarian scientists were now trialling the Russian vaccine in laboratories, “so that they’ll be able to make a well-based decision on its possible usability and licensing”.

However, under EU rules, the vaccine must be authorised by the European Medicines Agency before any member states can approve it for general use.

“The question arises whether a member state would want to administer to its citizens a vaccine that has not been reviewed by the EMA,” a European commission spokesperson told Reuters last week, adding that using an untested vaccine could have the result of lowering confidence in vaccines in general among the population.

The Hungarian-American financier and philanthropist George Soros, who has been the target of a long-running smear campaign by the Orbán government, last week wrote in an article that Hungary’s interest in the Russian vaccine “deserves to be investigated” given previous allegations of corruption against the Hungarian prime minister’s inner circle. Soros pointed out that Hungary appears to have paid up to 50 times more for ventilators than Germany, leading some to question the motives behind the deals.

In response, Orbán called Soros “the most corrupt man in the world” and said his advice on which vaccines to buy was not welcome. “It isn’t Soros’s job to decide which vaccines are good and which aren’t. That is for laboratories to decide and the Hungarian people, who will be free to choose from among several vaccines.”
 

vesicles

Colonel
@vesicles

Pfizer and Moderna actually have a choice as to whether they rollout their vaccines quickly or slowly.

But their premature press releases are designed to get as many customers as quickly as possible, and at as high a price as possible.

And if I analyse the situation further:

1. The number of trained healthcare professionals (who can administer vaccination shots) is limited.
2. The Moderna/Pfizer mRNA vaccines also have to be kept deep frozen which is a logistical nightmare.
3. In comparison, the adenovirus and inactivated vaccine front runners only need to be refrigerated.

What this means is that each Moderna/Pfizer mRNA vaccination will take a longer time for each medic to perform.
So when more Moderna/Pfizer vaccines are used, it slows down the overall vaccination effort.

Given that additional time = additional deaths, I think Moderna/Pfizer are acting in almost in a criminal manner by prematurely pushing their vaccines now

Yes, I agree with you on the potential logistic nightmare. I believe I was the first here to bring up the potential "logistic issues" with the Pfizer vaccine when their initial glowing report came out. It is a huge issue. In fact, I was just chatting with a colleague of mine in the hallway and I told him that I would choose the Moderna vaccine over the Pfizer vaccine, if I have a choice, because of the high risk of potentially messing up the ideal temperature during transit and storage.

By the way, the Moderna vaccine is stable at -20 deg C, which is the typical temperature of our kitchen freezer. So handling the Moderna vaccine is a lot easier than the Pfizer one. Transporting samples that must be kept at -20 is easy. And storing them is also a lot easier since every facility should be some kind of a kitchen freezer.

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I'm not sure about calling it a "criminal manner"... Every company has its right to advertise their products. As long as they faithfully and accurately report their findings, they are ok. If they manipulate their data, then it's criminal. It's up to the government to evaluate each claim unbiased and comes up with a decision.
 
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