Coronavirus Sars-CoV-2/Covid-19 Megathread

[The Larch]

Covidshield is AZ's vaccine made in India.

AFAIK Covidshield is the brand name of AstraZeneca's vaccine, it's not just the one made in India.

Alright, that's good. I did think it was ridiculous that it changes name because of being made in India.

It's a weird situation, as normally we don't call drugs by the laboratory that has developed them, but by brand names, but with Covid vaccines I guess that many laboratories haven't really done name branding as a priority or at all, or the press is just ignoring them. The Pfizer vaccine is actually branded as Comirnaty, for instance, but I don't think I've ever seen that name in any article, it's always "the Pfizer vaccine".

[Sheilbh]

It's a weird situation, as normally we don't call drugs by the laboratory that has developed them, but by brand names, but with Covid vaccines I guess that many laboratories haven't really done name branding as a priority or at all, or the press is just ignoring them. The Pfizer vaccine is actually branded as Comirnaty, for instance, but I don't think I've ever seen that name in any article, it's always "the Pfizer vaccine".

Yeah there's a lot weird about it. I don't think the entire world (and certainly me) have ever been so committed and invested in a series of clinical trials

[Grey Fox]

Covidshield is AZ's vaccine made in India.

AFAIK Covidshield is the brand name of AstraZeneca's vaccine, it's not just the one made in India.

Alright, that's good. I did think it was ridiculous that it changes name because of being made in India.

It's a weird situation, as normally we don't call drugs by the laboratory that has developed them, but by brand names, but with Covid vaccines I guess that many laboratories haven't really done name branding as a priority or at all, or the press is just ignoring them. The Pfizer vaccine is actually branded as Comirnaty, for instance, but I don't think I've ever seen that name in any article, it's always "the Pfizer vaccine".

Paracétamol
Tylenol

[The Larch]

Covidshield is AZ's vaccine made in India.

AFAIK Covidshield is the brand name of AstraZeneca's vaccine, it's not just the one made in India.

Alright, that's good. I did think it was ridiculous that it changes name because of being made in India.

It's a weird situation, as normally we don't call drugs by the laboratory that has developed them, but by brand names, but with Covid vaccines I guess that many laboratories haven't really done name branding as a priority or at all, or the press is just ignoring them. The Pfizer vaccine is actually branded as Comirnaty, for instance, but I don't think I've ever seen that name in any article, it's always "the Pfizer vaccine".

Paracétamol
Tylenol

Yup, those two are the same drug, Paracetamol is the generic name and Tylenol the brand name.

[Sheilbh]

I think in the UK we normally just have the generic name because branded medicines don't really exist - except for like Lemsip.

What I find slightly weird - though not with the covid vaccines - is that companies brand their generic drug with a name that also sounds like a generic drug

[The Larch]

I think in the UK we normally just have the generic name because branded medicines don't really exist - except for like Lemsip.

What I find slightly weird - though not with the covid vaccines - is that companies brand their generic drug with a name that also sounds like a generic drug

Most probably what you consider generic name is/was the original brand name of the drug that just became the byword for it. Aspirin, for instance, is a brand name registered by Bayer, but used widely as a generic name for acetylsalicylic acid, the chemical name for the drug.

[Sheilbh]

Most probably what you consider generic name is/was the original brand name of the drug that just became the byword for it. Aspirin, for instance, is a brand name registered by Bayer, but used widely as a generic name for acetylsalicylic acid, the chemical name for the drug.

Yeah - that's pretty likely.

Germany has joined other countries in suspending the AZ vaccine as a precautionary measure despite the EMA and all of these authorities saying there's no actual evidence of a link (and frankly - what's the point of the EMA if everyone's just going to ignore it?). In fact I think the German and French regulators were saying it was safe just a couple of days ago. In Italy the police have seized 400,000 doses. Given that I'm not seeing any experts saying there's a scientific reason for these suspensions it seems to me that it's just going to cause more people refusing the AZ vaccine. Certainly in Italy where you've got one prosecutor alleging manslaughter and the police seizing doses it feel like it's going to be impossible to run vaccine campaign with that vaccine now. I don't see how you can walk back to encourage people to take it.

And I'm not sure how we get to the point from here where we can say that it's "safe" based on these concerns - at the minute there's no evidence of a causal link, based on the clinical trials and the real-life distribution of 17 million doses in Europe (UK+EU) there's not a higher rate of blood clotting than you'd expect in that population. So I don't know what other evidence will be enough to address the fears/concerns that have led to these suspensions. It feels like this is conceding way too much to anti-vax sentiment - this sort of action isn't going to convince the hard-core anti-vaxers and just make everyone else more afraid/nervous/hesitant.

That this is happening just as B117 variant is becoming dominant in several European countries is insane to me.

Edit: Also obviously we had one of the worst outbreaks in the world - but this chart from the ONS is extraordinary

[alfred russel]

Not to be pedantic, but maybe if publishing "coronavirus: a year like no other" you should cut your charts off before reaching back to years when infectious disease deaths were as bad or worse than 2020.

[Malthus]

I don't know - the really startling part of this chart is that the great flu epidemic in the late teens of last century doesn't appear to have been nearly as bad from baseline of the time as Covid.

I think people understand that medicine and sanitation it the first word have gotten a lot better over the past couple of centuries or so, so the fact that the baseline morality was greater over a century or so than our covid peak doesn't undermine the point - the past year was terrible.

[Sheilbh]

I don't know - the really startling part of this chart is that the great flu epidemic in the late teens of last century doesn't appear to have been nearly as bad from baseline of the time as Covid.

I think people understand that medicine and sanitation it the first word have gotten a lot better over the past couple of centuries or so, so the fact that the baseline morality was greater over a century or so than our covid peak doesn't undermine the point - the past year was terrible.

Yeah I think it's extraordinary. I'm also intrigued by the tick up at the end of the 20th century - I'm wondering if that's just a reflection of people getting older? So sanitation and medicine take their effect but then as we age we have every year a few thousand flu deaths among the elderly?

[Zanza]

I have no real insights into the AZ numbers. If there really is a reason for concern then they need to act of course. But it needs to be a) calculated against the risks of more Covid deaths and serious cases and b) the effect this has on overall vaccine acceptance. My impression is that the first risk is way overblown compared to the other risks...

[celedhring]

Yeah, my mother has moved from AZ-hesitant to "no way I'm getting that shit". Going by all the data I can see the risk is overblown.

[Zanza]

A German politician pointed out that the contraception pill has a much, much higher risk of thrombosis than this and no one cares.

[Zanza]

I guess the damage this constant scepticism of AZ does will be much higher than any real damage from side effects will ever be.

[alfred russel]

I don't know - the really startling part of this chart is that the great flu epidemic in the late teens of last century doesn't appear to have been nearly as bad from baseline of the time as Covid.

I think people understand that medicine and sanitation it the first word have gotten a lot better over the past couple of centuries or so, so the fact that the baseline morality was greater over a century or so than our covid peak doesn't undermine the point - the past year was terrible.

"A Year Like No Other" isn't really supported if you point out that it was better than basically every year in human history prior to the birth of our grandparents.

Which brings us back to basic freedom, scientific understanding, and risk assessment. If someone had figured out the germ theory of disease back in the 1700s, well before we could really treat anything through vaccines, does that mean everyone should just stay home except for essential activities until the science of treatment and vaccines caught up? It is an absurd idea--the answer is obviously no--but at least in a US context, freedom of assembly has been significantly curtailed in a risk environment much less than what was in the risk environment when the rights were established.