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The General [Coronavirus] Discussion Thread: Fauci's Return

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Posts

  • ShadowfireShadowfire Vermont, in the middle of nowhereRegistered User regular
    My wife's been in PT for quite a while trying to mitigate some of the symptoms of her MS. Her therapist was great, really advocated for her pretty hard, just a nice guy. Then he suddenly disappeared and we had to reschedule all of her appointments. No one could tell us anything for obvious reasons, but someone let it slip that he was sick. Turns out the dude was out of work for four months because he got Covid, then pneumonia from the covid. He's back at work finally, but having trouble breathing and just trying to keep it together. Working half days because he's taking multiple naps just to keep functioning.

    Dude is ten years younger than me and in great shape. Ffffffffff.

    WiiU: Windrunner ; Guild Wars 2: Shadowfire.3940 ; PSN: Bradcopter
  • Marty81Marty81 Registered User regular
    Weren't the vaccine efficacy rates judged at different lengths of time since the first shot, and it was later discovered that the jnj shot's efficacy improves into the 90+% range by week 8 or so?

  • burboburbo Registered User regular
    Marty81 wrote: »
    Weren't the vaccine efficacy rates judged at different lengths of time since the first shot, and it was later discovered that the jnj shot's efficacy improves into the 90+% range by week 8 or so?

    I hadn't seen that, but that's quite the interesting tidbit if true, and exactly the kind of info I was looking for. Do you have a citation or anything for that?

  • AngelHedgieAngelHedgie Registered User regular
    Cello wrote: »
    Corvus wrote: »
    Welp:







    Reuters, and CBC are news agencies. India and Europe restricting / considering restricting exports of vaccines. This is obviously meaningless to most of you who are Americans, but for those of us in the rest of the world, it's a big deal.

    This is so exhausting and deflating

    I'm happy for my American friends, truly, and am glad they'll be safe, but we aren't aren't at the point where my senior parents can access vaccines, and it's hard not to be at least a little pissed off that people a third their age are getting vaccines due to the "fuck you, got mine" export ban they've got going, and now the only other major suppliers in the EU are taking inspiration

    It's going to be a hard summer being adjacent to a party that just sort of assumes we're all in the same boat of being past all this

    It turns out that the export ban is yet another present from the Trump Administration:
    For officials hoping to finally pivot from domestic to international vaccination strategy, there was another major catch, reported here for the first time.

    The contracts the Trump administration signed with the vaccine manufacturers prohibit the U.S. from sharing its surplus doses with the rest of the world. According to contract language Vanity Fair has obtained, the agreements with Pfizer, Moderna, AstraZeneca, and Janssen state: “The Government may not use, or authorize the use of, any products or materials provided under this Project Agreement, unless such use occurs in the United States” or U.S. territories.

    The clauses in question are designed to ensure that the manufacturers retain liability protection, but they have had the effect of projecting the Trump administration’s America First agenda into the Biden era. “That is what has completely and totally prohibited the U.S. from donating or reselling, because it would be in breach of contract,” said a senior administration official involved in the global planning effort. “It is a complete and total ban. Those legal parameters must change before we do anything to help the rest of the world.”

    XBL: Nox Aeternum / PSN: NoxAeternum / NN:NoxAeternum / Steam: noxaeternum
  • SanderJKSanderJK Crocodylus Pontifex Sinterklasicus Madrid, 3000 ADRegistered User regular
    The mrna vaccines
    MorganV wrote: »
    Looks like Australia done fucked up, and will remain fucked for the long term (comparatively to similar countries).

    Prime Minister. - We're going all in on AstraZeneca.
    PM - Europe are holding back our doses, and we've got no Plan B.
    Europe - No, we're not.
    PM - Yes you are, and we still have no Plan B.
    Europe - No we're not.
    PM - Yeah, we're not comfortable with the potential health risks of AstraZeneca. Also, we don't have a Plan B.

    So now, who knows. There's little risk to the population as long as we maintain reasonable protections (~10-20 daily cases since October, 2 total deaths). But knowing there's no end in sight, is frustrating.

    I was initially looking at hoping to get the jab in July/August, so I can travel in October/November. That idea is pretty much fucked. I have family in the US I haven't seen since 2019, and 2021 is probably out, because our conservative party (who have not been bad during the pandemic) have finally let their incompetence shine on through (also their misogyny, but that's another issue).

    https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-56658501

    This is mostly framing. The EU has blocked 250000 doses. Australia was mostly going to supply itself. The far bigger setback is what all non UK AZ users are experiencing: Woeful underdelivery of supply. This is the case in the EU and India too

    Now no doubt there is a global shortage of more basic supplies, and there too all blocs are restricting export.

    Steam: SanderJK Origin: SanderJK
  • VishNubVishNub Registered User regular
    The entire AZ rollout has been a train wreck.

  • Marty81Marty81 Registered User regular
    burbo wrote: »
    Marty81 wrote: »
    Weren't the vaccine efficacy rates judged at different lengths of time since the first shot, and it was later discovered that the jnj shot's efficacy improves into the 90+% range by week 8 or so?

    I hadn't seen that, but that's quite the interesting tidbit if true, and exactly the kind of info I was looking for. Do you have a citation or anything for that?

    It's just something I feel like I remember, which is why I phrased it as a question. I went looking for a citation yesterday, actually, and couldn't find it, so if anyone could help with that it'd be great. All I could find were a bunch of articles that were really light on the facts. Even a link to the actually phase 3 outcomes that I could read would be welcome.

  • skippydumptruckskippydumptruck begin again Registered User regular
    edited April 2021
    Marty81 wrote: »
    burbo wrote: »
    Marty81 wrote: »
    Weren't the vaccine efficacy rates judged at different lengths of time since the first shot, and it was later discovered that the jnj shot's efficacy improves into the 90+% range by week 8 or so?

    I hadn't seen that, but that's quite the interesting tidbit if true, and exactly the kind of info I was looking for. Do you have a citation or anything for that?

    It's just something I feel like I remember, which is why I phrased it as a question. I went looking for a citation yesterday, actually, and couldn't find it, so if anyone could help with that it'd be great. All I could find were a bunch of articles that were really light on the facts. Even a link to the actually phase 3 outcomes that I could read would be welcome.

    I'm not familiar with StatNews but this seems like a clear explaination:
    The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines have shown astonishing — and essentially equivalent — degrees of efficacy, at least in the early stages after vaccination.

    The Moderna vaccine was 94.1% effective at preventing symptomatic Covid-19 after the second dose. The vaccine’s efficacy appeared to be slightly lower in people 65 and older, but during a presentation to the Food and Drug Administration’s advisory committee in December, the company explained that the numbers could have been influenced by the fact there were few cases in that age group in the trial. The vaccine appeared to be equally effective across different ethnic and racial groups.

    But comparing the efficacy of those vaccines to the efficacy of Johnson & Johnson’s is challenging because of differences in the designs of the Phase 3 clinical tests — essentially the trials were testing for different outcomes. Pfizer’s and Moderna’s trials both tested for any symptomatic Covid infection. Pfizer started counting cases from seven days after receipt of the second dose of vaccine, while Moderna waited until day 14 to start counting cases.

    J&J, by contrast, sought to determine whether one dose of its vaccine protected against moderate to severe Covid illness — defined as a combination of a positive test and at least one symptom such as shortness of breath, beginning from 14 or 28 days after the single shot. (The company collected data for both.)

    Because of the difference in the trials, making direct comparisons is a bit like comparing apples and oranges. Additionally, Pfizer and Moderna’s vaccines were tested before the emergence of troubling new variants in Britain, South Africa, and Brazil. It’s not entirely clear how well they will work against these mutated viruses.

    The J&J vaccine was still being tested when the variants were making the rounds. Much of the data generated in the South African arm of the J&J trial involved people who were infected with the variant first seen in South Africa, called B.1.351.

    The J&J one-dose vaccine was shown to be 66% protective against moderate to severe Covid infections overall from 28 days after injection, though there was variability based on geographic locations. The vaccine was 72% protective in the United States, 66% protective in South America, and 57% protective in South Africa.

    But the vaccine was shown to be 85% protective against severe disease, with no differences across the eight countries or three regions in the study, nor across age groups among trial participants. And there were no hospitalizations or deaths in the vaccine arm of the trial after the 28-day period in which immunity developed.

    https://www.statnews.com/2021/02/02/comparing-the-covid-19-vaccines-developed-by-pfizer-moderna-and-johnson-johnson/

    so it sounds like their efficacy studies were just differently designed and are not directly comparable

    idk if there are any real world follow on studies yet, or if any are in the works, that might compare the vaccines on the same types of efficacy

    skippydumptruck on
  • ForarForar #432 Toronto, Ontario, CanadaRegistered User regular
    I'm pretty sure we already had that one posted here a while ago, and did the usual 2 pages of puns that D&D is contractually obligated to go through.

    First they came for the Muslims, and we said NOT TODAY, MOTHERFUCKER!
  • VishNubVishNub Registered User regular
    edited April 2021
    We did.

    But it’s also the answer the the question a few posts up.

    VishNub on
  • burboburbo Registered User regular
    That write up is similar to others I've seen, and honestly it doesn't make sense for the case that J&J doesn't give reduced immunity compared to the others. The main caveats they cite are:

    1. mRNA were testing for any symptomatic infection compared, wheras J&J tested for "moderate to severe" infection. If anything, this biases any outcomes to look favorable for J & J.
    2. mRNA were looking for infections earlier post vax than J &J. Again, this biases outcomes to look better for J and J than they would have otherwise.
    3. J and J was running while variants more prevalent. Now this one actually does bias things against J and J. By how much? Its really hard to say without knowing the prevalance of variants at the times of the study, and without knowing the comparable efficacy against those variants. But if I'm looking at decrease from 95% to 72%, there has to be a fuck ton of variants, which much reduced efficacy, to account for that difference.

    That's why I get frustrated. All of these articles just say "caveats! No way to estimate which is better for immunity" which, IMO, is not really doing its best to inform us.

  • SanderJKSanderJK Crocodylus Pontifex Sinterklasicus Madrid, 3000 ADRegistered User regular
    edited April 2021
    The Netherlands joins the club of restricting AZ to 60+ because of the Thrombosis complication.

    It is a frustrating decision. The way current stats seem to lean, is roughly 1/100k chance of bad complications, 1/300k of long term impact , 1/1m death, possibly lessened now that the source is clear and medical procedures should improve.

    For the next 2 weeks it has very little impact, because AZ was currently going to 60-65. But around the 20th it was supposed to start on 55-60. People that are about 100-1000x more likely to end up in hospital from covid than this vaccin.

    It could be that we instead flip it up to 66-70, who are currently still waiting for Pfizer.

    It also means we're basically putting ourselves at the mercy of Pfizer, who if we stop AZ become 70% of our pre Q3 mix.

    SanderJK on
    Steam: SanderJK Origin: SanderJK
  • TetraNitroCubaneTetraNitroCubane The Djinnerator At the bottom of a bottleRegistered User regular
    I found this video from Vox to be a pretty succinct and straightforward discussion of the topic:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K3odScka55A

    Vox is a sizeable news outlet.

    VuIBhrs.png
  • burboburbo Registered User regular
    edited April 2021
    I found this video from Vox to be a pretty succinct and straightforward discussion of the topic:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K3odScka55A

    Vox is a sizeable news outlet.

    I saw that video too, and I don't feel like it addresses any of the points that I've been trying to communicate. It is just making the initial arguments, to which I am making counterpoints, (or questions about their arguments, really), and I never see anything that really relates to my counterpoints. It's just another rehash of the initial arguments.

    burbo on
  • asurasur Registered User regular
    edited April 2021
    burbo wrote: »
    redx wrote: »
    asur wrote: »
    burbo wrote: »
    So, forgive me if there has already been plenty of discussion on this, i scrolled back 15 pages and didnt find it.

    If one has the opportunity to get J and J or an mRNA vax, should they really try to get one or the other? Ive seen the effectiveness numbers, and the caveats about different times and places, and the caveats about numbers not relating to serious illness, and i understand the pjblic health need to get everyone vaccinated as quickly as possible. But all that being said, different time and place doesnt really feel like ot would account for 20x reduced chance to 3x reduced chance, does it? Esp since during the J and J trials, the variants were still not that prevalent.

    Does anyone have any compelling info on this, beyond the points i cited above? Points that may relate to an individual's decision for their family, rather than considering the public health initiative as top priority?

    The J&J vaccine has variants included in it's trials by default as they were conducted in the US, Brazil and South Africa. If anything those trials give a better picture of the response than either mRNA vaccine though I believe you can find decent following research for those. The other compelling point is that J&J was 100% effective against hospitalization and death which are the primary factors to consider.

    J&J is 1 and done. That's very attractive from a "I just want this to be done." point of view, particularly if you are on the fence about your local vaccine infrastructure or are having to travel to get your shot. Efficacy wise, they are pretty comparable.

    You still have to wait for full effectiveness either way, but not having to wait for the second shot, and potentially hunt that down, and take another chunk of time off, seems nice.

    See, im not sure i really believe that their effectiveness is comparable. I know the efficacy numbers dont tell the whole story, but mathematically, a small fraction of variants in the population shouldnt account for the big drop on measured effectiveness. Also, they keep saying J and J focused on reducing moderate to sever infection, while mRNA focused on reducing symptomatic infection, which sounds to me like J and J was actually being judged on an easier standard.

    I keep seeing that the numbers are "not comparable", which I'm fine with at face, but its normal to try and do some adjusting to make it comparable. I feel like all of the messaging around "just get whatever! There are caveats to the measurements!" Is very different than saying "they prob would have performed about the same" had the trials been done the same way. Which I'm not seeing.

    Like i said, i understand the public health motivation to get everyone some vax ASAP, and i find the convenience of J and J nice, but I wouldn't really want to go into the future with a lowered degree of immunity, and just saying "the trials were conducted differently, we can't compare" just isn't the same as "the trials were conducted differently, they are prob about the same".

    The number of variants in the J&J study isn't trivial as two of the locations were Brazil and South Africa where variants were dominant and this can be seen in the decrease in effectiveness between the US and those locations. The studies may not be exactly comparable, but on the results that matter hospitalizations and deaths they are and J&J is at a disadvantage due to variants.

    Given that variants are becoming dominant in the US as well, it's difficult or impossible state which vaccine is the best as there is no or limited data for the vaccine against specific variants and it may change as the dominant variant changes.

    Edit: apparently Moderna clinical did look for symptomatic cases so removed that bit

    asur on
  • burboburbo Registered User regular
    edited April 2021
    asur wrote: »
    burbo wrote: »
    redx wrote: »
    asur wrote: »
    burbo wrote: »
    So, forgive me if there has already been plenty of discussion on this, i scrolled back 15 pages and didnt find it.

    If one has the opportunity to get J and J or an mRNA vax, should they really try to get one or the other? Ive seen the effectiveness numbers, and the caveats about different times and places, and the caveats about numbers not relating to serious illness, and i understand the pjblic health need to get everyone vaccinated as quickly as possible. But all that being said, different time and place doesnt really feel like ot would account for 20x reduced chance to 3x reduced chance, does it? Esp since during the J and J trials, the variants were still not that prevalent.

    Does anyone have any compelling info on this, beyond the points i cited above? Points that may relate to an individual's decision for their family, rather than considering the public health initiative as top priority?

    The J&J vaccine has variants included in it's trials by default as they were conducted in the US, Brazil and South Africa. If anything those trials give a better picture of the response than either mRNA vaccine though I believe you can find decent following research for those. The other compelling point is that J&J was 100% effective against hospitalization and death which are the primary factors to consider.

    J&J is 1 and done. That's very attractive from a "I just want this to be done." point of view, particularly if you are on the fence about your local vaccine infrastructure or are having to travel to get your shot. Efficacy wise, they are pretty comparable.

    You still have to wait for full effectiveness either way, but not having to wait for the second shot, and potentially hunt that down, and take another chunk of time off, seems nice.

    See, im not sure i really believe that their effectiveness is comparable. I know the efficacy numbers dont tell the whole story, but mathematically, a small fraction of variants in the population shouldnt account for the big drop on measured effectiveness. Also, they keep saying J and J focused on reducing moderate to sever infection, while mRNA focused on reducing symptomatic infection, which sounds to me like J and J was actually being judged on an easier standard.

    I keep seeing that the numbers are "not comparable", which I'm fine with at face, but its normal to try and do some adjusting to make it comparable. I feel like all of the messaging around "just get whatever! There are caveats to the measurements!" Is very different than saying "they prob would have performed about the same" had the trials been done the same way. Which I'm not seeing.

    Like i said, i understand the public health motivation to get everyone some vax ASAP, and i find the convenience of J and J nice, but I wouldn't really want to go into the future with a lowered degree of immunity, and just saying "the trials were conducted differently, we can't compare" just isn't the same as "the trials were conducted differently, they are prob about the same".

    The number of variants in the J&J study isn't trivial as two of the locations were Brazil and South Africa where variants were dominant and this can be seen in the decrease in effectiveness between the US and those locations. The studies may not be exactly comparable, but on the results that matter hospitalizations and deaths they are and J&J is at a disadvantage due to variants.

    Given that variants are becoming dominant in the US as well, it's difficult or impossible state which vaccine is the best as there is no or limited data for the vaccine against specific variants and it may change as the dominant variant changes.

    Edit: apparently Moderna clinical did look for symptomatic cases so removed that bit

    I do find the number of variants argument for the other territories to be persuasive, but not sure how it translates to US. I do think one advantage to J and J is that it has some amount of proven effectiveness against variants.

    As far as "results that matter", i.e. hospitalizations and deaths. We are starting to look at very small samples sizes. In Moderna trial, there were placebo 30 hospitalizations, and 1 death. 30 to 0 for hospitalizations if pretty good, but you can't really say 100%. You could say, maybe > 97% effective. But for deaths, to see 0 deaths, down from 1, and call that 100% effective, and then to say they are all equally effective, is honestly statistical malpractice.

    Also, given the choice, its weird to just decide that getting a non hospitalization super flu doesn't matter to people. Especially for folks who tend to get very sick. And also with the existence of long haul Covid, which is really quite concerning, esp for people who already deal with chronic illness.. No one here is wondering if J and J is less good than no vaccine, but the idea that people are saying "non hospitalization flus don't matter" honestly seems like a concession to the idea that J and J doesn't give the same level of immunity.

    burbo on
  • BrodyBrody The Watch The First ShoreRegistered User regular
    Anecdotally, with the barest understanding of any of this, I would go for the mRNA vaccine, as my understanding is that it teaches your body to look out for a single factor that is more likely to remain common among COVID variants, whereas the JnJ vaccine teaches your body to alert to a grab bag of potential signifiers, which could be less stable among variants. Either way, one or the other is still better than nothing, but given the choice, I'd aim for mRNA.

    "I will write your name in the ruin of them. I will paint you across history in the color of their blood."

    The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson

    Steam: Korvalain
  • burboburbo Registered User regular
    VishNub wrote: »

    Somehow I missed this post earlier, but in addition to being a very sexy chart, this is also very helpful for info about J & J. Thanks for posting!

  • Marty81Marty81 Registered User regular
    burbo wrote: »
    asur wrote: »
    burbo wrote: »
    redx wrote: »
    asur wrote: »
    burbo wrote: »
    So, forgive me if there has already been plenty of discussion on this, i scrolled back 15 pages and didnt find it.

    If one has the opportunity to get J and J or an mRNA vax, should they really try to get one or the other? Ive seen the effectiveness numbers, and the caveats about different times and places, and the caveats about numbers not relating to serious illness, and i understand the pjblic health need to get everyone vaccinated as quickly as possible. But all that being said, different time and place doesnt really feel like ot would account for 20x reduced chance to 3x reduced chance, does it? Esp since during the J and J trials, the variants were still not that prevalent.

    Does anyone have any compelling info on this, beyond the points i cited above? Points that may relate to an individual's decision for their family, rather than considering the public health initiative as top priority?

    The J&J vaccine has variants included in it's trials by default as they were conducted in the US, Brazil and South Africa. If anything those trials give a better picture of the response than either mRNA vaccine though I believe you can find decent following research for those. The other compelling point is that J&J was 100% effective against hospitalization and death which are the primary factors to consider.

    J&J is 1 and done. That's very attractive from a "I just want this to be done." point of view, particularly if you are on the fence about your local vaccine infrastructure or are having to travel to get your shot. Efficacy wise, they are pretty comparable.

    You still have to wait for full effectiveness either way, but not having to wait for the second shot, and potentially hunt that down, and take another chunk of time off, seems nice.

    See, im not sure i really believe that their effectiveness is comparable. I know the efficacy numbers dont tell the whole story, but mathematically, a small fraction of variants in the population shouldnt account for the big drop on measured effectiveness. Also, they keep saying J and J focused on reducing moderate to sever infection, while mRNA focused on reducing symptomatic infection, which sounds to me like J and J was actually being judged on an easier standard.

    I keep seeing that the numbers are "not comparable", which I'm fine with at face, but its normal to try and do some adjusting to make it comparable. I feel like all of the messaging around "just get whatever! There are caveats to the measurements!" Is very different than saying "they prob would have performed about the same" had the trials been done the same way. Which I'm not seeing.

    Like i said, i understand the public health motivation to get everyone some vax ASAP, and i find the convenience of J and J nice, but I wouldn't really want to go into the future with a lowered degree of immunity, and just saying "the trials were conducted differently, we can't compare" just isn't the same as "the trials were conducted differently, they are prob about the same".

    The number of variants in the J&J study isn't trivial as two of the locations were Brazil and South Africa where variants were dominant and this can be seen in the decrease in effectiveness between the US and those locations. The studies may not be exactly comparable, but on the results that matter hospitalizations and deaths they are and J&J is at a disadvantage due to variants.

    Given that variants are becoming dominant in the US as well, it's difficult or impossible state which vaccine is the best as there is no or limited data for the vaccine against specific variants and it may change as the dominant variant changes.

    Edit: apparently Moderna clinical did look for symptomatic cases so removed that bit

    I do find the number of variants argument for the other territories to be persuasive, but not sure how it translates to US. I do think one advantage to J and J is that it has some amount of proven effectiveness against variants.

    As far as "results that matter", i.e. hospitalizations and deaths. We are starting to look at very small samples sizes. In Moderna trial, there were placebo 30 hospitalizations, and 1 death. 30 to 0 for hospitalizations if pretty good, but you can't really say 100%. You could say, maybe > 97% effective. But for deaths, to see 0 deaths, down from 1, and call that 100% effective, and then to say they are all equally effective, is honestly statistical malpractice.

    Also, given the choice, its weird to just decide that getting a non hospitalization super flu doesn't matter to people. Especially for folks who tend to get very sick. And also with the existence of long haul Covid, which is really quite concerning, esp for people who already deal with chronic illness.. No one here is wondering if J and J is less good than no vaccine, but the idea that people are saying "non hospitalization flus don't matter" honestly seems like a concession to the idea that J and J doesn't give the same level of immunity.


    There should be confidence intervals on these things, but again, I can’t find the actual text of the phase 3 trial results.

    I would also like to know the extent to which the vaccines protect against long term damage (lung, heart, smell, etc) but I cannot find this info anywhere.

  • VishNubVishNub Registered User regular
    edited April 2021
    Edit: Misunderstood the question

    The vaccines have at this point been shown to prevent infection, not just symptoms. Ergo, damage caused by infection is prevented to at least that extent.

    VishNub on
  • VishNubVishNub Registered User regular
    edited April 2021
    VishNub on
  • DoodmannDoodmann Registered User regular
    First stab get!

    Sounds like a lot of Calfiornia opened up eligibility today.

    Whippy wrote: »
    nope nope nope nope abort abort talk about anime
    Sometimes I sell my stuff on Ebay
  • BremenBremen Registered User regular
    burbo wrote: »
    asur wrote: »
    burbo wrote: »
    redx wrote: »
    asur wrote: »
    burbo wrote: »
    So, forgive me if there has already been plenty of discussion on this, i scrolled back 15 pages and didnt find it.

    If one has the opportunity to get J and J or an mRNA vax, should they really try to get one or the other? Ive seen the effectiveness numbers, and the caveats about different times and places, and the caveats about numbers not relating to serious illness, and i understand the pjblic health need to get everyone vaccinated as quickly as possible. But all that being said, different time and place doesnt really feel like ot would account for 20x reduced chance to 3x reduced chance, does it? Esp since during the J and J trials, the variants were still not that prevalent.

    Does anyone have any compelling info on this, beyond the points i cited above? Points that may relate to an individual's decision for their family, rather than considering the public health initiative as top priority?

    The J&J vaccine has variants included in it's trials by default as they were conducted in the US, Brazil and South Africa. If anything those trials give a better picture of the response than either mRNA vaccine though I believe you can find decent following research for those. The other compelling point is that J&J was 100% effective against hospitalization and death which are the primary factors to consider.

    J&J is 1 and done. That's very attractive from a "I just want this to be done." point of view, particularly if you are on the fence about your local vaccine infrastructure or are having to travel to get your shot. Efficacy wise, they are pretty comparable.

    You still have to wait for full effectiveness either way, but not having to wait for the second shot, and potentially hunt that down, and take another chunk of time off, seems nice.

    See, im not sure i really believe that their effectiveness is comparable. I know the efficacy numbers dont tell the whole story, but mathematically, a small fraction of variants in the population shouldnt account for the big drop on measured effectiveness. Also, they keep saying J and J focused on reducing moderate to sever infection, while mRNA focused on reducing symptomatic infection, which sounds to me like J and J was actually being judged on an easier standard.

    I keep seeing that the numbers are "not comparable", which I'm fine with at face, but its normal to try and do some adjusting to make it comparable. I feel like all of the messaging around "just get whatever! There are caveats to the measurements!" Is very different than saying "they prob would have performed about the same" had the trials been done the same way. Which I'm not seeing.

    Like i said, i understand the public health motivation to get everyone some vax ASAP, and i find the convenience of J and J nice, but I wouldn't really want to go into the future with a lowered degree of immunity, and just saying "the trials were conducted differently, we can't compare" just isn't the same as "the trials were conducted differently, they are prob about the same".

    The number of variants in the J&J study isn't trivial as two of the locations were Brazil and South Africa where variants were dominant and this can be seen in the decrease in effectiveness between the US and those locations. The studies may not be exactly comparable, but on the results that matter hospitalizations and deaths they are and J&J is at a disadvantage due to variants.

    Given that variants are becoming dominant in the US as well, it's difficult or impossible state which vaccine is the best as there is no or limited data for the vaccine against specific variants and it may change as the dominant variant changes.

    Edit: apparently Moderna clinical did look for symptomatic cases so removed that bit

    I do find the number of variants argument for the other territories to be persuasive, but not sure how it translates to US. I do think one advantage to J and J is that it has some amount of proven effectiveness against variants.

    As far as "results that matter", i.e. hospitalizations and deaths. We are starting to look at very small samples sizes. In Moderna trial, there were placebo 30 hospitalizations, and 1 death. 30 to 0 for hospitalizations if pretty good, but you can't really say 100%. You could say, maybe > 97% effective. But for deaths, to see 0 deaths, down from 1, and call that 100% effective, and then to say they are all equally effective, is honestly statistical malpractice.

    Also, given the choice, its weird to just decide that getting a non hospitalization super flu doesn't matter to people. Especially for folks who tend to get very sick. And also with the existence of long haul Covid, which is really quite concerning, esp for people who already deal with chronic illness.. No one here is wondering if J and J is less good than no vaccine, but the idea that people are saying "non hospitalization flus don't matter" honestly seems like a concession to the idea that J and J doesn't give the same level of immunity.

    Honestly, if a doctor was right in front of me and asked "would you like Pfizer or Johnson and Johnson?" I'd say Pfizer. But if he said "All we've got is Johnson and Johnson" I'd happily take it. Because yeah, even if both were perfect at preventing serious illness, no illness at all is still a better result.

    The other question is efficacy vs variants, and I don't think there's great info available right now, but from what I've understand all three vaccines seem to have reduced but still substantial efficacy vs the current variants. It'd be great if we had the numbers to say "Vaccine A is better than Vaccine B against the South African variant" or similar, but I think those numbers just don't exist.

  • AbsoluteZeroAbsoluteZero The new film by Quentin Koopantino Registered User regular
    First Pfizer BioNTech poke today. Injection site is sore to the touch, but otherwise so far so good. So uh, where can I buy a Zune?

    cs6f034fsffl.jpg
  • MeeqeMeeqe Lord of the pants most fancy Someplace amazingRegistered User regular
    burbo wrote: »
    As far as "results that matter", i.e. hospitalizations and deaths. We are starting to look at very small samples sizes. In Moderna trial, there were placebo 30 hospitalizations, and 1 death. 30 to 0 for hospitalizations if pretty good, but you can't really say 100%. You could say, maybe > 97% effective. But for deaths, to see 0 deaths, down from 1, and call that 100% effective, and then to say they are all equally effective, is honestly statistical malpractice.

    You neglected to mention or notice that those hospitalizations and deaths were from the placebo group. From the study itself, in the results section of the abstract:
    "Severe Covid-19 occurred in 30 participants, with one fatality; all 30 were in the placebo group."

    Please take a minute people and read the studies you are quoting from before encouraging vaccine skepticism.

  • burboburbo Registered User regular
    edited April 2021
    Meeqe wrote: »
    burbo wrote: »
    As far as "results that matter", i.e. hospitalizations and deaths. We are starting to look at very small samples sizes. In Moderna trial, there were placebo 30 hospitalizations, and 1 death. 30 to 0 for hospitalizations if pretty good, but you can't really say 100%. You could say, maybe > 97% effective. But for deaths, to see 0 deaths, down from 1, and call that 100% effective, and then to say they are all equally effective, is honestly statistical malpractice.

    You neglected to mention or notice that those hospitalizations and deaths were from the placebo group. From the study itself, in the results section of the abstract:
    "Severe Covid-19 occurred in 30 participants, with one fatality; all 30 were in the placebo group."

    Please take a minute people and read the studies you are quoting from before encouraging vaccine skepticism.

    I'm not really sure what you mean here. You bolded 11 words, and one of them was the word placebo. What are you thinking I missed? The whole quote you used is based around the idea that you think I missed.

    I'm not encouraging vaccine skepticism. I've been pro vaccine the whole dang time. Trying to actually understand the effects of the different vaccines is not a bad thing.

    burbo on
  • MeeqeMeeqe Lord of the pants most fancy Someplace amazingRegistered User regular
    burbo wrote: »
    Meeqe wrote: »
    burbo wrote: »
    As far as "results that matter", i.e. hospitalizations and deaths. We are starting to look at very small samples sizes. In Moderna trial, there were placebo 30 hospitalizations, and 1 death. 30 to 0 for hospitalizations if pretty good, but you can't really say 100%. You could say, maybe > 97% effective. But for deaths, to see 0 deaths, down from 1, and call that 100% effective, and then to say they are all equally effective, is honestly statistical malpractice.

    You neglected to mention or notice that those hospitalizations and deaths were from the placebo group. From the study itself, in the results section of the abstract:
    "Severe Covid-19 occurred in 30 participants, with one fatality; all 30 were in the placebo group."

    Please take a minute people and read the studies you are quoting from before encouraging vaccine skepticism.

    I'm not really sure what you mean here. You bolded 11 words, and one of them was the word placebo. What are you thinking I missed?

    I'm not encouraging vaccine skepticism. I've been pro vaccine the whole dang time. Trying to actually understand the effects of the different vaccines is not a bad thing.

    Go read the Moderna study, its posted on this page. The bad side effects (30 hospitalizations, and 1 death) you are saying where from the vaccine? Those hospitalizations and deaths occurred within the placebo group, not the group given the vaccine. While those deaths are attributable to the Moderna Trial, they aren't attributable to the vaccine itself. You accused the Moderna team of statistical malpractice, and I'm saying you should read the study itself because it directly refutes your issues with the published effectiveness numbers. I bolded the following to draw attention to those specific numbers, because they are directly addressed in the study. The easiest place to find that info is in the result section of the study's abstract.

    Trying to understand the effects of the vaccine is great, but the study showed 0 hospitalizations from the group receiving the vaccine.

  • quovadis13quovadis13 Registered User regular
    Pfizer is in me!

    Which is good because it seems that we here in Michigan seem uninterested in doing anything to stop this third wave other than just wait until we vaccinate enough people.

  • BremenBremen Registered User regular
    Meeqe wrote: »
    burbo wrote: »
    Meeqe wrote: »
    burbo wrote: »
    As far as "results that matter", i.e. hospitalizations and deaths. We are starting to look at very small samples sizes. In Moderna trial, there were placebo 30 hospitalizations, and 1 death. 30 to 0 for hospitalizations if pretty good, but you can't really say 100%. You could say, maybe > 97% effective. But for deaths, to see 0 deaths, down from 1, and call that 100% effective, and then to say they are all equally effective, is honestly statistical malpractice.

    You neglected to mention or notice that those hospitalizations and deaths were from the placebo group. From the study itself, in the results section of the abstract:
    "Severe Covid-19 occurred in 30 participants, with one fatality; all 30 were in the placebo group."

    Please take a minute people and read the studies you are quoting from before encouraging vaccine skepticism.

    I'm not really sure what you mean here. You bolded 11 words, and one of them was the word placebo. What are you thinking I missed?

    I'm not encouraging vaccine skepticism. I've been pro vaccine the whole dang time. Trying to actually understand the effects of the different vaccines is not a bad thing.

    Go read the Moderna study, its posted on this page. The bad side effects (30 hospitalizations, and 1 death) you are saying where from the vaccine? Those hospitalizations and deaths occurred within the placebo group, not the group given the vaccine. While those deaths are attributable to the Moderna Trial, they aren't attributable to the vaccine itself. You accused the Moderna team of statistical malpractice, and I'm saying you should read the study itself because it directly refutes your issues with the published effectiveness numbers. I bolded the following to draw attention to those specific numbers, because they are directly addressed in the study. The easiest place to find that info is in the result section of the study's abstract.

    Trying to understand the effects of the vaccine is great, but the study showed 0 hospitalizations from the group receiving the vaccine.

    I think the problem here is you're trying to correct him, but he's saying exactly what you said. He said there were 30 hospitalizations and 1 death among the placebo group and none among the vaccine group, with the takeaway that such small numbers aren't great for statistical analysis. You seemed to think that he didn't realize those numbers were for the placebo group and keep trying to correct him, even though it's exactly what he said.

  • burboburbo Registered User regular
    Meeqe wrote: »
    burbo wrote: »
    Meeqe wrote: »
    burbo wrote: »
    As far as "results that matter", i.e. hospitalizations and deaths. We are starting to look at very small samples sizes. In Moderna trial, there were placebo 30 hospitalizations, and 1 death. 30 to 0 for hospitalizations if pretty good, but you can't really say 100%. You could say, maybe > 97% effective. But for deaths, to see 0 deaths, down from 1, and call that 100% effective, and then to say they are all equally effective, is honestly statistical malpractice.

    You neglected to mention or notice that those hospitalizations and deaths were from the placebo group. From the study itself, in the results section of the abstract:
    "Severe Covid-19 occurred in 30 participants, with one fatality; all 30 were in the placebo group."

    Please take a minute people and read the studies you are quoting from before encouraging vaccine skepticism.

    I'm not really sure what you mean here. You bolded 11 words, and one of them was the word placebo. What are you thinking I missed?

    I'm not encouraging vaccine skepticism. I've been pro vaccine the whole dang time. Trying to actually understand the effects of the different vaccines is not a bad thing.

    Go read the Moderna study, its posted on this page. The bad side effects (30 hospitalizations, and 1 death) you are saying where from the vaccine? Those hospitalizations and deaths occurred within the placebo group, not the group given the vaccine. While those deaths are attributable to the Moderna Trial, they aren't attributable to the vaccine itself. You accused the Moderna team of statistical malpractice, and I'm saying you should read the study itself because it directly refutes your issues with the published effectiveness numbers. I bolded the following to draw attention to those specific numbers, because they are directly addressed in the study. The easiest place to find that info is in the result section of the study's abstract.

    Trying to understand the effects of the vaccine is great, but the study showed 0 hospitalizations from the group receiving the vaccine.

    My guy/gal, please understand, you are not reading my statements correctly. I am saying quite clearly that those hospitalizations and deaths were not from the vaccine, but were the placebo group. I honestly am not sure how you are missing it, since you bolded the part where I made it explicit. I'm 100% in agreement with you that the study shows placebo:vaccine hospitalizations = 30:0 and deaths = 1:0.

    I'm also not saying the study is statistical malpractice. I'm saying the REPORTING of "100% effective against death!" because placebo:vaccine is 1:0 is statistical malpractice, because that is by no means a statistically significant sample to make such a claim. I also say the REPORTING of "100% effective against hospitalizations" is suspect, because 30 samples aren't enough to make a determination with that much precision.

  • BrodyBrody The Watch The First ShoreRegistered User regular
    edited April 2021
    edit: The first post in this chain was maybe unfairly clipped from the original, and my reply maybe isn't valid.

    Brody on
    "I will write your name in the ruin of them. I will paint you across history in the color of their blood."

    The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson

    Steam: Korvalain
  • TastyfishTastyfish Registered User regular
    edited April 2021
    Brody wrote: »
    Anecdotally, with the barest understanding of any of this, I would go for the mRNA vaccine, as my understanding is that it teaches your body to look out for a single factor that is more likely to remain common among COVID variants, whereas the JnJ vaccine teaches your body to alert to a grab bag of potential signifiers, which could be less stable among variants. Either way, one or the other is still better than nothing, but given the choice, I'd aim for mRNA.

    Eh, the J&J vaccine is still instructions for the spike protein, just in DNA delivered via an 'empty' virus rather than the mRNA one that can penetrate cells easier on it's own. It's the same principle from the point of the body's immunity side

    Tastyfish on
  • BrodyBrody The Watch The First ShoreRegistered User regular
    Tastyfish wrote: »
    Brody wrote: »
    Anecdotally, with the barest understanding of any of this, I would go for the mRNA vaccine, as my understanding is that it teaches your body to look out for a single factor that is more likely to remain common among COVID variants, whereas the JnJ vaccine teaches your body to alert to a grab bag of potential signifiers, which could be less stable among variants. Either way, one or the other is still better than nothing, but given the choice, I'd aim for mRNA.

    Eh, the J&J vaccine is still instructions for the spike protein, just in DNA delivered via an 'empty' virus rather than the mRNA one that can penetrate cells easier on it's own. It's the same principle from the point of the body's immunity side

    Ah, good to know. Are any of the current vaccines traditional weakened/dead viral loads, or are they all various spike protein delivery systems?

    Also, I guess that makes me feel like JnJ and Moderna/Pfizer should ultimately even out statistically?

    "I will write your name in the ruin of them. I will paint you across history in the color of their blood."

    The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson

    Steam: Korvalain
  • MeeqeMeeqe Lord of the pants most fancy Someplace amazingRegistered User regular
    Thanks for the correction! I apparently did read your post exactly backwards, my apologies!

  • redxredx I(x)=2(x)+1 whole numbersRegistered User regular
    edited April 2021
    Brody wrote: »
    Tastyfish wrote: »
    Brody wrote: »
    Anecdotally, with the barest understanding of any of this, I would go for the mRNA vaccine, as my understanding is that it teaches your body to look out for a single factor that is more likely to remain common among COVID variants, whereas the JnJ vaccine teaches your body to alert to a grab bag of potential signifiers, which could be less stable among variants. Either way, one or the other is still better than nothing, but given the choice, I'd aim for mRNA.

    Eh, the J&J vaccine is still instructions for the spike protein, just in DNA delivered via an 'empty' virus rather than the mRNA one that can penetrate cells easier on it's own. It's the same principle from the point of the body's immunity side

    Ah, good to know. Are any of the current vaccines traditional weakened/dead viral loads, or are they all various spike protein delivery systems?

    Also, I guess that makes me feel like JnJ and Moderna/Pfizer should ultimately even out statistically?

    https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-55212787

    The Sinovac is using a pretty much dead virus vaccine. They're the company making [one of] the [like 5] Chinese ones if you couldn't guess that from the name and URL.

    redx on
    They moistly come out at night, moistly.
  • burboburbo Registered User regular
    Meeqe wrote: »
    Thanks for the correction! I apparently did read your post exactly backwards, my apologies!

    Happens to the best of us :)

    For the record, I'm going to end up going with J and J. I found the dick chart sufficiently persuasive, along with the increased convenience, field tests with variants, and common methodology behind each (in terms of, creates a spike protein for your body to fight).

  • TastyfishTastyfish Registered User regular
    edited April 2021
    I think they are all spike protein delivery systems, including the Russian Sputnik V (which is more or less the same as J&J, but uses a dummy human virus rather than a chimp one).
    Novavax is the odd one out, in that it uses a moth cell line to produce little lipid bubbles with the spike protein on the outside - making artificial 'fake viruses' with the spike protein on them, with the body reacting to the fake particles themselves rather than it's own cells presenting spike protein as if they had been infected by the real virus.

    Tastyfish on
  • BrodyBrody The Watch The First ShoreRegistered User regular
    edited April 2021
    Are spike protein vaccine's something we've used before, or has it all been in development until now?

    Brody on
    "I will write your name in the ruin of them. I will paint you across history in the color of their blood."

    The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson

    Steam: Korvalain
  • TastyfishTastyfish Registered User regular
    edited April 2021
    A lot of this was put into action in the wake of SARS and then MERS. So the platforms were ready, they just needed the protein to put in which was sequenced pretty rapidly.
    As soon as the outbreak hit the news and the sequences were made public, the researchers knew what type of virus it was and what kind of protein would be most obvious (and whether a rapid vaccine would be suitable, corona viruses don't mutate as fast as flu does, so you might have a year to get it out.)

    Most viruses only have a few proteins on the surface, so there's not a lot of choice when it comes to picking a vaccine target. It's going to be something like either the coat or the spike proteins. They are wildly smaller than things like bacterial cells, by orders of magnitude of genes.
    The big new thing has been the delivery vectors, rather than the target.

    Tastyfish on
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