COVID-19 vaccine

[RizZy]

There's a few where I work that have said they don't want to get the vaccination, one guy in particular has spent the last 6-12 months in & out of hospital having checks done as he's having breathing problems & various lesions & all sorts, the Docs have no idea what's up with him but they do know his lungs are shagged - so the potential for covid to really mess him up if he should get it is presumably quite large, yet he's adamant he doesn't want the jab, last time I spoke to him about it it was all made up by China & Bill Gates just wants to put a chip in him, I told him he was a twat & that was the end of that conversation.

[smilodon]

There's a point where you have to sort of accept evolutionary biology and let anti vaxxers get on with it.

"There is no medication, lifestyle change, public health innovation, or medical procedure ever developed that has even come close to the life-saving, life-extending, and primary prevention benefits associated with vaccines."

S. Jay Olshansky, professor of epidemiology and biostatistics at the University of Illinois at Chicago School of Public Health

[SithAfrikaan]

This is a weird thread to read if you (I) think its only logical to ask who is liable if something goes wrong, and this article https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/distributing-vaccines-and-treatments-for-covid-19-and-flu/consultation-document-changes-to-human-medicine-regulations-to-support-the-rollout-of-covid-19-vaccines makes it difficult to understand at best, but from what I see, not one of the companies or anyone administering it are, please correct me if I'm wrong here.

To use Pen's scarf analogy, the way I understand it is its 3 scarfs, 1000 people helped knit each scarf independently, not a single person on the work force is liable for the hole in the scarf, but it still keeps you kind of warm if you wear it just right.

I've accepted that this is an inevitable part of our / my life going forward, but to ignore the fact that these companies are making a lot of money off these products (a quick google can reveal) for me is a stark reminder that there is no such thing as altruism.

[TeaLeaf]

When you say 'these companies are making a lot of money off these products' I think that is a little to broad brush as there are muchos complexities here.  In general terms all companies will benefit indirectly due to improved manufacturing capacity, or indirect research benefits, so we have to take that as read.  However some deserve it more than others.

The Pfizer/BioNTech partnership are treating this as a commercial deal, so they set a price and a profit margin make profit.  Is it justifiable, from a moral perspective in these circumstances my answer is no.  However they used their own money to develop the vaccine, so one could argue it was their capital risk and therefore theirs from which to profit.   Whilst Pfizer used its own resources to fund the development (it is big enough after all), you might then point out that the article says the tiny (by comparison) BioNTech received â,¬375m from the German government and â,¬100m as a loan from the European Investment Bank.  However the â,¬375m only one of three research grants announced in September 2020 by the German government to to further speed up the development of the vaccine and to fund expanded trials and manufacturing capacity for the vaccine.  The EIB â,¬100m loan was July 2020 and it has to be paid back, so is not profit, it's just an enabler.  Both were well after a commitment had been made to start the research and spend money, so arguably they deserve the profit opportunity on financial grounds if not moral grounds.   At the end of the day we also need to remember that governments give such pharma grants all the time as part of the general scientific research drive undertaken by all governments.

SPUTNIK V is for profit but is still half the price of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine.

Astra Zeneca/Oxford have taken the 'not for profit' approach, for which I applaud them.  They are also the cheapest vaccine at about £3-4 per dose, which is about 80% less per dose than the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine.  They still funded about 80% of the costs themselves but taken the moral high ground by delivering at cost.

Moderna are the ones we should be annoyed at, they had close to 100% government funding on their vaccine work yet are charging the most at circa $37 per dose!  Unless their process is somehow considerably more expensive than anyone else's process, they really ought to be more competitive on the pricing and selling it on a not for profit basis.

Johnson & Johnson was another who said they would do it on a not for profit basis.

I don't know much about the others being developed, but iirc Sinovac was privately funded and is like Moderna charging a lot more than most per dose, whilst Novavax and Curevac were mostly government funded (but I have no idea on their projected/actual prices).  


So, back to the original question, are companies making a lot of money from this?  Yes, in a direct way some are, but some like Astra Zeneca/Oxford and Johnson & Johnson are definitely not.  They all benefit indirectly from the money as it gives them better manufacturing capacity, a broader research base and better preparation for SARS vaccines in future (and other vaccines) etc.  

But shouldn't a government support and spend research money in these areas for the public benefit?   Would we be better off if we banned profit from vaccines?  Might that lead to less capacity in that market and therefore worse outcomes for public health in the longterm?   An interesting question with a long discussion over many pints of real ale at the next LAN.........   :cheers:

[SithAfrikaan]

I'm only keeping my response so short because I'm in front of a firing squad here, and I really appreciate that answer TL, I wouldn't have said that was my main question though, my main question/point is

who is liable if something goes wrong, and this article https://www.gov.uk/government/consul...id-19-vaccines makes it difficult to understand at best, but from what I see, not one of the companies or anyone administering it are, please correct me if I'm wrong here.

Again, I feel like I have to preface this with the fact that I'm not an anti-vaxxer or more simply "twat" as mentioned previously, I know this is the requirement, and also what will soon develop into a gated entry to the LAN's, entertainment of any kind shops /etc we all love.

[TeaLeaf]

Yeah, sorry, I was also dodging the firing squad, so I thought I would answer the bit that I could! :biggrin:

I'm not a lawyer, but my reading agrees with yours.  If a decision is made to roll out a mass vaccination program, then that decision is made by government not by the companies, and therefore those companies supplying, making, administering etc the mandated by government (e.g.) vaccine are exempt from liability.  The proposed changes seem to strengthen that protection and limit liability.  The same duty of care rules still apply though, so it would still not give carte blanche to people to manufacture doses without due diligence.

[albert]

I only know 2 things:

1) Dolly Parton donated $1m to Vanderbilt University Medical Center's research that went towards the Moderna vac. She gets nothing back for her donation (being a charitable donation and all).

2) "Up until 2020, these mRNA biotech companies had poor results testing mRNA drugs for cardiovascular, metabolic and renal diseases" - Source: https://www.statnews.com/2017/01/10/moderna-trouble-mrna/

Opinion, speculation and more opinion:

COVID-19 came at just the right time for those biotechs who had poured millions into mRNA research, literally it was like all their Christmases came at once, and what was a doomed approach became viable in the space of weeks. Also what became possible was fast track approval for mRNA vaccines which had (have!) a terrible safety and side effect record.

I side with Sith, regardless of profit, opportunity has knocked for Moderna and Pfizer/ BioNTech and they have not only pulled themselves out of the fire but have no accountability for the possibile future health issues that their products leave users with.

I'm not an anti-vac lunatic, I would however prefer to receive the Oxford DNA based or if one becomes available a more traditional RNA vaccine than the mRNA.

So if anyone who had the mRNA type, please let us know if your balls drop off or you grow an extra nose in the near future :norty:

[TeaLeaf]

So if anyone who had the mRNA type, please let us know if your balls drop off or you grow an extra nose in the near future :norty:

Cue: coffee spat all over keyboard. :roflmao:

[SithAfrikaan]

I side with Sith...

We truly are in the end times then :roflmao: :lmfao:

[smilodon]

I wonder what level of responsibility generally low risk, healthy people have in doing our bit to protect the more vulnerable in our society. Lockdowns are all kind of horrible and clearly unsustainable for much longer. Would any of us be thrilled at another winter lockdown this coming autumn? It's a personal choice but the moral thing seems pretty obvious to me.

Mass immunisation looks to be the way out of this situation for everyone. If there is actually any real risk to taking an mRNA vaccine I think I need to weigh up a small chance of me getting ill from the vaccine against a much larger chance of others being killed if Covid-19 remains circulating and mutating in the population.

And of course as is always the case rich Western nations can debate the pros and cons of vaccination at their leisure, while a huge swathe of the world aren't going to be given that same choice any time soon. I'm more bugged by the seeming lack of 'giving all a fair share' than I am about who's getting rich from this Pandemic.

[albert]

We truly are in the end times then :roflmao: :lmfao:

I know first time for everything!

I wonder what level of responsibility generally low risk, healthy people have in doing our bit to protect the more vulnerable in our society...

I'm listening for news of the people who have volunteered to be injected with variants of the actual viruses. Seems these folks are doing their bit, I think they have to have had COVID-19 already and minimal symptoms to qualify.

[smilodon]

Yeah now that really is stepping up and doing your bit.

[Chaosphere]

I'm only keeping my response so short because I'm in front of a firing squad here, and I really appreciate that answer TL, I wouldn't have said that was my main question though, my main question/point is

who is liable if something goes wrong, and this article https://www.gov.uk/government/consul...id-19-vaccines makes it difficult to understand at best, but from what I see, not one of the companies or anyone administering it are, please correct me if I'm wrong here.

Again, I feel like I have to preface this with the fact that I'm not an anti-vaxxer or more simply "twat" as mentioned previously, I know this is the requirement, and also what will soon develop into a gated entry to the LAN's, entertainment of any kind shops /etc we all love.

I don't think anyone is liable, if things go wrong, and I'll try to explain why.

COVID is a global problem, it affects everyone. Developing the vaccine has been a global effort, and we have ended up with a few different flavours of vaccine as a result.

These flavours have been studied fairly well prior to mass release, but of course time is of the essence here and things have had to be somewhat sped up as a result.

Medicine is always going to have side effects, more so when we have to hurry in testing. This is an inevitable risk. Some people will take the medicine and be fine, others will not. The scientific world (which is not just limited to drug companies) does what it can to minimise risk, but there will always be an unlucky few.

Going back to how I started, this is a global pandemic that affects us all. So, we all have to share in the responsibility of dealing with it. We all have to deal with this risk. Different groups of people have done what they can to get us treatments, be that medical treatment (and there has been plenty of risk there too) or via preventative vaccination, but it was never going to be perfect. The risk these treatments carry is shared among us just as the disease is.

It isn't any one person's fault if you or I end up with a side effect, just like it isn't any one person's fault if we end up with the disease. COVID is here as a result of our species' growth and infringement into the 'natural' world. It's a bug that has come about from the destruction of normal ecosystems and the 'unnatural' mixing of different animal species that results. We can't blame the governments, drug companies, scientists, doctors... it isn't anyone's fault, it's an unavoidable consequence of the situation we have ended up in.

We all have to deal with it as a disease, and we all have to deal with the treatment too. The alternative is not sustainable. For every person dying of the virus, there are what, 4 or 5 sitting in hospital for a week or more on oxygen, who eventually make it home but take up a hospital bed in the meantime. It is this patient load that causes the main issue, as healthcare systems around the world simply can't cope with the strain. If we don't all step up and share in the responsibility of dealing with the pandemic, our healthcare systems will collapse, and it will lead to far more deaths and increased morbidity from not just COVID, but from all the other health problems we deal with day in, day out.

This is a time of crisis, for the entire world. Yes there is risk associated with the treatments, but those risks are necessary to avoid the above. We all have to accept that, and really we all have to shoulder some of that burden. This is an abnormal situation, and it asks for an abnormal response as a result - by this I mean accepting an amount of risk for yourself to benefit everyone. It requires an amount of selflessness for the greater good. If enough people avoid that, we end up with inadequate vaccination and inadequate immunity across populations as a result, and the problem continues. It might 'fizzle out' after a few years (we don't know yet) as we reach herd immunity via survivor immunity, but the amount of damage this time would do to people's health - we are already seeing the impact of people avoiding healthcare, of procedures, tests, and investigations being delayed and postponed due to the pandemic - is just phenomenal.

I understand people's trepidation over the vaccines, I do. They are not yet thoroughly tested and long term effects are unknown (much might I add, like COVID), inevitably some will end up with unfortunate side effects (the unlucky few), and this is frightening. You can't blame anyone when things go wrong, because as a global community we are all simply doing the best we can with what we have. We all simply have to accept some risk here, to get the job done. I'll say again, the alternative is simply not a sustainable option. On balance, globally, the risk:benefit ratio of the vaccines swings far, far towards the benefit side, and so I believe we all have to accept that small bit of risk to do our part to protect others and hopefully in the process, ourselves too.

These are my own thoughts and opinions, and you're welcome to disagree with them, in parts or in entirety. It is a controversial topic and lots of people have differences in opinion that clash with bits of what I have written above. That's ok, you're allowed to think for yourself. Personally I hope enough people realise there isn't an alternative to the vaccinations, and accept having one not only for their own benefit but to protect others too - both from COVID and from a healthcare system that can't look after the 'usual' issues whilst going through a pandemic. Sadly, I don't think COVID is going away anytime soon, and we might be faced with yearly problems from this or other similar bugs. I also don't think this is the last time we as a species will see a global pandemic, I feel with how we treat the world and the environments we live in, further such events are pretty much inevitable.

[Liberator]

Well I got the text yesterday and will be being pumped with one concoction or another next Thursday.

I want the inevitable super powers we will all develop in a few years time, I've done my research by watching the documentary "The Boys", I know how it works.

[OldBloke]

Well I got the text yesterday and will be being pumped with one concoction or another next Thursday.

I want the inevitable super powers we will all develop in a few years time, I've done my research by watching the documentary "The Boys", I know how it works.

I'm guessing you'll favour Translucent. I know I would :norty: