Coronavirus Sars-CoV-2/Covid-19 Megathread

[The Larch]

Hopefully the J&J will also be ready for approval soon.

Not in the EU, they'be been running a couple of months behind the AZ one, so maybe they won't get approved until March.

[Sheilbh]

Not in the EU, they'be been running a couple of months behind the AZ one, so maybe they won't get approved until March.

Ah. I've no idea on timeline but I thought they'd released data but not actually applied for approval anywhere and we might get an application in the next month but maybe not.

[The Larch]

Not in the EU, they'be been running a couple of months behind the AZ one, so maybe they won't get approved until March.

Ah. I've no idea on timeline but I thought they'd released data but not actually applied for approval anywhere and we might get an application in the next month but maybe not.

They started their rolling review with EMA on December. For comparison, AZ started in October, IIRC.

At the moment it's the only vaccine in the EMA pipeline. There were rumours about Sputnik submitting for approval in February, but let's see.

[Sheilbh]

Early signs in Israel and the UK on the effectiveness of vaccines - in both countries it looks like the number of cases in vaccinated groups (the over-60s in Israel; over 80s in the UK) is falling faster than general case numbers. But both countries started new lockdowns at around the same time as they were vaccinating so it's tough to disentangle.

According to the news we have finally finished vaccinating care home residents so in a couple of weeks there should be a decent amount of immunity in care homes. I think that is the highest risk group in the UK because of how badly we've protected care homes so it's good that they'll be largely safe in a couple of weeks time.

I've also seen a couple of encouraging polls from different European countries showing pretty big increases in willingness to get vaccinated. It feels like people were generally suspicious when it was in theory but now it's actually being rolled out are more comfortable. I mentioned before but in a weird way it feels like it might help in encouraging everyone to get vaccinated that it's elders who are getting done first, not kids.

Edit: Incidentally I hope if we have any capacity to help out Portugal that we do. I'm not sure we do because admissions are declining but I think the number of people in hospital and ICU beds is still close to the peak - but I hope people in government are at least thinking about it. Not least because I still think some European states may be hit badly once the UK variant becomes dominant/haven't locked down enough to stop the spread of the new variant.

[The Larch]

Edit: Incidentally I hope if we have any capacity to help out Portugal that we do. I'm not sure we do because admissions are declining but I think the number of people in hospital and ICU beds is still close to the peak - but I hope people in government are at least thinking about it. Not least because I still think some European states may be hit badly once the UK variant becomes dominant/haven't locked down enough to stop the spread of the new variant.

Admissions might be declining because they're close to the limit of their resources. They're going to receive medical help from Germany this week, not just with equipment but also with personnel (I read over the weekend a stat that said that something like 70% of all medical personnel in Portugal had been infected with Covid), as the Bundeswehr was going to set up a field hospital. The situation there is quite dire for what transpires in the press. Emergency refrigerators in cargo containers for corpses outside hospitals, ICUs at their limit almost all over the country, sick people in the continent having to be taken to Madeira for hospital admission, other countries having to offer to take on some of their sick (Austria already confirmed, Germany is almost a given as well). It's not pretty over there, apparently...

[Josquius]

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2021/jan/31/industralised-vaccine-behind-scenes-at-newcastle-covid-operation

Great local news

[Sheilbh]

From Sky News - obviously more information needed and there is still no evidence that vaccines don't work against variants (though effectiveness might be lower for different variants):

BREAKING: Public Health England has detected samples of the Kent #COVID19 variant with mutations that might help it evade the immune system

[The Larch]

In different news, what the hell is wrong with some people.

And apparently the answer is "being fucking crazy":

Wisconsin pharmacist who destroyed more than 500 vaccine doses believes Earth is flat, FBI says

When a pharmacist discovered that 57 vials of the Moderna vaccine were left to spoil outside a Wisconsin clinic's refrigerator in December, the worker immediately suspected a colleague who had spread false and outlandish claims, according to court records.

For months, Steven Brandenburg, the overnight pharmacist at Aurora Medical Center in Grafton, Wis., had said he thought the vaccine would harm people, make them infertile and implant them with microchips.

Now, federal authorities say his belief in debunked claims went beyond the vaccine. The pharmacist, who has agreed to plead guilty to charges of attempting to spoil the vaccine, also believes the Earth is flat and that the sky is not real, according to court documents.

His beliefs were revealed in court after a search of Brandenburg's phone, computer and hard drive by the FBI. The documents include interviews with Brandenburg and Aurora Medical Center pharmacy technician Sarah Sticker, who told authorities she discovered the unrefrigerated doses of the Moderna vaccine at around 3 a.m. on Dec. 26. The unsealed records were first reported by the Daily Beast.
(...)
In another interview with authorities, Sticker said Brandenburg sent her text messages promoting false beliefs he supported, including that the sky was not really the sky but a "shield put up by the government to prevent individuals from seeing God," court records show.

Flat Earth and the vaccine carrying microchips are common nutty beliefs at this point, but I think the "the sky is not real" one is something new in conspiraland.

[The Brain]

The sky is certainly not as real as a brick or a good firm handshake, but still...

[garbon]

In different news, what the hell is wrong with some people.

And apparently the answer is "being fucking crazy":

Wisconsin pharmacist who destroyed more than 500 vaccine doses believes Earth is flat, FBI says

When a pharmacist discovered that 57 vials of the Moderna vaccine were left to spoil outside a Wisconsin clinic's refrigerator in December, the worker immediately suspected a colleague who had spread false and outlandish claims, according to court records.

For months, Steven Brandenburg, the overnight pharmacist at Aurora Medical Center in Grafton, Wis., had said he thought the vaccine would harm people, make them infertile and implant them with microchips.

Now, federal authorities say his belief in debunked claims went beyond the vaccine. The pharmacist, who has agreed to plead guilty to charges of attempting to spoil the vaccine, also believes the Earth is flat and that the sky is not real, according to court documents.

His beliefs were revealed in court after a search of Brandenburg's phone, computer and hard drive by the FBI. The documents include interviews with Brandenburg and Aurora Medical Center pharmacy technician Sarah Sticker, who told authorities she discovered the unrefrigerated doses of the Moderna vaccine at around 3 a.m. on Dec. 26. The unsealed records were first reported by the Daily Beast.
(...)
In another interview with authorities, Sticker said Brandenburg sent her text messages promoting false beliefs he supported, including that the sky was not really the sky but a "shield put up by the government to prevent individuals from seeing God," court records show.

Flat Earth and the vaccine carrying microchips are common nutty beliefs at this point, but I think the "the sky is not real" one is something new in conspiraland.

Quite the doozy. And wild that God, the all powerful, is unable to pierce said shield put up presumably by America. America is the real God?

[Syt]

Quite the doozy. And wild that God, the all powerful, is unable to pierce said shield put up presumably by America. America is the real God?

Well, duh.

[mongers]

Good news on the Sputnik V vaccine effectiveness. 

[Sheilbh]

Good news on the Sputnik V vaccine effectiveness. 

Yes - just seen. Great news

[Grey Fox]

You Brits are naive.

[Sheilbh]

It's been published in the Lancet which is fairly reputable (with certain big black marks against its name - Dr Wakefield and the very long wait for a retraction ).

The thing I'm seeing attracting attention here is people noting that it works "remarkably" like the AZ vaccine which is interesting given that there were reports of state-sponsored hacking of Oxford and other vaccine developers through the year. Which may be nothing or may be something. Either way someone else is producing an effective vaccine.