I heard the UK government celebrating that it had given single doses of vaccine to 15 million people yesterday, and that it intended to deliver many more such single doses before it actually gives the second, required, dose that delivers vaccination to almost anyone.
The breathless announcements, mindlessly repeated in the media, fuelled right wing demands that the country be taken out of lockdown just as Boris Johnson admitted that even sending schools back would push R back above 1, and so guarantee the need for another lockdown.
What I did not hear was the data that I wanted. Amongst the reports of falling cases what was not said was how many were becoming ill despite having had a vaccine. Nor was it said which vaccine they might have had. And the same was not said for deaths.
And yet it is impossible that this data is not known now. And if the desire was informed debate it would be published. There is now more than enough data on this to know efficacy, and variations in it.
So why does the government not want us to be able to appraise its policies? And why too does it not want us to be able to appraise our risks from having differing vaccines? What could its reason for keeping us in the dark be?
Could it be that there is something it does not want us to know?
Could it actually be that there is very little vaccine effect as yet, precisely because people have not actually been vaccinated? Is it that only lockdown is working in the UK, unlike say, Israel, where double dosing is the norm?
My very strong suspicion is that there is very good reason to be suspicious of the government's silence in this data. The only thing that the government is seeking to mange right now is the news media reporting of its vaccine policy, and not its actual success in controlling the virus itself.
There are occasions when the absence of data on a critical issue when that data must exist is reason in itself to doubt the agency controlling that information. This is one such occasion.
My guess is that the government already knows its policy choice is failing, but is too frightened of the madness in its own party ranks (as ever) to admit this, and so we will be kept in the dark until the next upsurge is locked into the system.
And who will they blame next time?
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My thoughts exactly. My wife has has first dose but we are still playing safe as I don’t want her open to infection till at least 14 days after the second which is a long time yet. The government have made a complete hash all the way through this pandemic and I have no faith they won’t do the same with this!
Democracy can only work well if you have the data to make judgements on. We appear to live in an age where an increasing number of people don’t understand why democracy exists because they’re not taught it at school, our media often controlled by a few denigrates it, and now so do many of our politicians:-
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/57-gop-officials-at-capitol-insurrection_n_6026e5e2c5b6f88289fb90a6
Just to reinforce the lack of understanding about the importance of democracy and how it should work an American poll shows only three in five Americans believe Trump should have been convicted at his recent impeachment trial:-
https://www.ipsos.com/en-us/abcnews-impeachment-poll
Well, the BBC are reporting that “[the government’s] approach for the Oxford vaccine is now backed by the World Health Organization which says giving two doses 8-12 weeks apart increased the vaccine’s effectiveness and provided greater protection.”
But what do the WHO know if Richard Murphy hasn’t heard the data he wants?
The WHO has little choice: that’s the only one they have to use and are saying better to use that than anything else, in effect
I have read the reports
Ignorance is strength – 1984. Orwell understood the importance of controlling information for an authoritarian regime. Shutting down the Internet is still to come, following the introduction of movement orders.
As someone professionally involved in Covid research discussions , I’m puzzled at this article. Scientists have been very keen to answer the questions behind this article (as am I, with my vaccination due this afternoon), and to put their research in the public domain. Here for instance is a study published by government in December on the first-dose efficacy of the 2 vaccines being used in the UK: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/949505/annex-a-phe-report-to-jcvi-on-estimated-efficacy-of-single-vaccine-dose.pdf
Of course this is from scientific trials, so doesn’t tell us what’s going on in the general population. Data on that will be inevitably messy, and difficult to assess in real time, but if outcomes are radically different from what the trials predict I am confident scientists would be all over it, and with results put quickly in the public domain.
You’re puzzled?
If so, please provide the data.
If not, why are you puzzled?
The question I have asked is entirely treasonable
Why aren’t you puzzled at the absence of an answer?
“The question I have asked is entirely treasonable”
Whoops ! 🙂
The government would have a major problem if one of its chosen vaccines was shown (or even widely suspected) to be less effective than another. Even if the difference were only marginal ‘customer choice’ would create mayhem if the media were to whip up a storm.
How Freudian
Hi Richard,
Independent SAGE have been calling for this data too. Very important given that the government is betting everything on vaccinations, which are incomplete. I am really worried that this government will cause yet another surge in cases, undermine the Ox/AZ vaccine and put us all back to square 1.
If there is deliberate silence, I see a more benign “conspiracy” and suspect that the government (or just as likely its scientists) has made a deliberate decision not to release tentative early data whose reliability isn’t yet established because it doesn’t want to feed the Tory backbenchers baying for pubs to open tomorrow.
It is an interesting and possibly encouraging sign that the pandemic has made the public eager for real data rather than just rhetoric. The trouble is they want the data that by its nature isn’t yet available because it takes time to get.
Result data from vaccination is like that. It takes up to 3 weeks from the first dose to get the immunity benefit, and there still needs to be time to get infected or not. That means they ought to be able only now to see any effect on cases from vaccinations prior to 18th Jan. However cases are expected to show less of an effect than hospitalisations or deaths for which the delay in numbers is longer and you are talking about vaccinations prior to approximately 8th Jan or 1st Jan respectively. There weren’t nearly as many vaccinated by those dates, so it will need more sophisticated analysis to identify the effect.
Having said that, I would hope for hard information to start emerging in the next week.
It’s just short termism with this incompetent bunch. Get some positive headlines thanks to their chums in the media and then just bullshit, lie, mislead and blame-shift when the questions get asked.
With the Quockerwodger, it’s never about what is best for the country overall, it’s about that’s evenings headlines and getting some positive ones. Hence ‘PM mildly ‘optimistic” or whatever it was.
Craig
They know; have a look at the model released by Imperial recently:
https://t.co/kl09Dzebq9?amp=1
or https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/958913/S1024_SPI-M_vaccination_ask_Imperial_College.pdf:
But it is not being addressed
The reporting of this is highly confusing (I suspect deliberately so) as politicians are stating 15million first doses given, whereas the wording in the articles say 14.6million in first 4 priority groups have been ‘offered’ the injection.
Given up take will never be 100% I’m unsure how the numbers tally with each other.
Going by this governments record I’m more inclined to believe nowhere near 15million have had the jab, but they have had a letter.
Reality is the UK has fully vaccinated 500,000 people, way behind many in Europe who are working the 3 week waiting time. Also the 15 Million, is that actual needles into arms or vaccinations offered as they love to manipulate data. Remember when a pair of gloves was classed as 2 items of PPE when they were lying about the PPE fiasco.
So right Richard to highlight this – so depressing the BBC spends days parroting not only Johnson’s 15m hubris , but the Steve Baker’s Covid Recovery Group’s strategy to enable the virus to keep spreading and people dying. They spend time with Tony Blair’s vaccine passports – anything but really examining the case for trying to suppress infection to near zero as in Aus, NZ, Sk, etc etc
Independent Sage have been politely asking for the ‘Efficacy’ data you are asking for – how many hospital cases have had one vaccine etc.
The UK is behind several EU countries in the full vaccination double dose league table
https://www.theguardian.com/world/commentisfree/2021/feb/14/brexit-britain-eu-covid-vaccination-fiasco
Thanks
“efficacy” refers to the vaccine effects in the test groups.
“effectiveness” refers to the vaccines effects in real-world conditions.
They’re not the same.
The test groups largely excluded people with severe medical conditions, and people were self-excluded who would refuse any vaccine.
From knowing several people who work with elderly people in care homes I know that around 15% of them are refusing any vaccine. That will also be the case in the outside world. If 25% of the population refuse vaccination, or if the vaccines are below their stated test efficacy in the real world, then the real effectiveness of any vaccine cannot be known for many months. If ever.
Then we move onto the next problem: Second-dose-refusal-due-to-first-dose-side-effects. This is going to be a problem too. If someone has had a sars-cov-2 infection in the past, they are going to have a more pronounced reaction to the first dose. Many people have had that infection and been mildly symptomatic, or asymptomatic.
No vaccine has been 100%. The much-vaunted smallpox vaccinations effect was, in reality, due to the intensive separate and isolate policy as much as the vaccination policy.
This world if much more highly populated than the start of the 20th century. Vaccine refusal and individual vaccine effectiveness will, in all likelihood, result in the disease just being reduced but not eliminated. I won’t even mention disease mutation. Or immunity to the virus only being short-lived. Which it will be.
When the vaccination program moves onto children, many parents are going to be extremely wary. The anti-vaxxers have been very vocal in this group.
Then there is another problem, largely unspoken: The ones succumbing to the disease are not exactly those the govt, any govt, really want to live long lives. Not a nice comment, but people are starting to calculate the savings due to covid deaths.
It is only the 70+ age group plus some health & care staff who have had the single does so far. These groups are probably being extra cautious anyway not to be exposed to the virus so any reduction so far is probably too small to make a propaganda point out of. The Astra Zeneca/Oxford vaccine may not be so effective against the South African and other new variants so the govt dont want to show this either Until a significcant number in the younger age groups have had both injections and some time has passed for them to be effective the govt wont be crowing about their success.
No other groups have had it too
My twin has because of suggested medical need
My wide ahs been offered it this week and is in her 50s, again because of suggested medical need
So it is more widespread than you suggest
And 15 million is enough to draw conclusions – even amongst those who had it more than 3 weeks ago
The question I am asking is a really simple one – and the government must know the answer
This data matters to me. As a middle-aged fat man I am at some elevated risk and taking all reasonable precautions to avoid the disease. I will get a jab shortly and it will become effective after 3 weeks….. and that will probably coincide with a lifting of some restrictions. I will then have to make choices about what activities I engage in. Should I hold a party for 300 random people crammed into my house? Should I visit my sister to walk in the fields? I like to take calculated risks and I need to know…
(a) estimated number of people who have the infection (so I can gauge how likely it is that I come into contact with an infected person) (b) number of positive tests of vaccinated and unvaccinated people (1 and 2 doses) (c) hospitalization numbers of vaccinated and unvaccinated people.
Is it too much to ask that this data be published?
Can we persuade a journalist to ask the question directly to the Chief Medical Officer?
Richard,is this what your looking for from the ONS, i think its called the yellow card system for reporting adverse reactions from the vax jab, the UK Colum cover lots of this stuff.
long long 53 page list of vaccine injury. Blindness on page 8
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/960150/COVID-19_mRNA_Pfizer_BioNTech_vaccine_analysis_print.pdf
No, not really
These are side effects
I want to know the number of deaths of people who have had a vaccine and the number of people testimng positive after a vaccine, by vaccine type
It’s really straightforward stuff
We have told my father (90 y/o) to keep isolating until at least two weeks after the second dose. At that time we may know a bit more than now – although not anything useful from this government.
We are saying the same to my wife’s older relatives – second dose and at least two weeks before checking the situation. After that, remain vigilant and keep distance from others.
And, to answer your headline – you know why the government denies us proper considered information – welcome to 1970s Stalingrad.
I think you are very wise
I don’t actually think that the data is certainly there as yet and they will be rightly cautious about announcing anything that is just an indication at present.
The bulk of the vaccinations will have been carried out with the AZ vaccine. We know that all the vaccines take around 3 weeks before much in the way of protection takes effect and the stronger immune response then usually comes following the second dose. We have enough data to indicate that leaving a longer gap between the doses provides an overall stronger response with the AZ vaccine (and possibly others) and it should be the case that a single dose can greatly reduce the severity of infections, so we’re basically in the midst of a big experiment to see how well this can work. Bear in mind it is only just over the past couple of weeks that the encouraging data is appearing from Israel and they began their vaccination programme earlier than we did and at much higher levels. It may be another few weeks before we know for certain just how the numbers are going.
What complicates things is that Nervtag have concluded that it is probable that the B.1.1.7 ‘Kent’ variant is more virulent as well as much more transmissible than the previous Covid-19 variants in circulation. This being the case, it will be difficult to understand the serious illness and mortality numbers in comparison to those of earlier waves of infection without a grasp of just how much more virulent it actually is. The good news here is that it seems that all the vaccines including the AZ one are likely to be pretty effective against the B.1.1.7 variant so hopefully, even with a single dose, the number of serious cases and deaths will be lower than it might have been but, with greater virulence, there will be greater mortality. Trying to work out how effectively the vaccination programme is working is trying to hit a moving target without this knowledge. Not to mention the concern that cases have been found where B.1.1.7 seems to be picking up the E484K mutation as in the South African variant, so there may be vaccine escape to consider in the UK as well…
It should be noted that it’s not just our government which is being cautious with the release of data – for all the trials of the various vaccines in South Africa there isn’t data publicly available which mentions whether reinfections caused by the new variant over there tend to be milder, the same or worse than the original infection and information about what and what classifies as a serious case is somewhat fudged as well.
It seems strange to be defending the actions of this government given all we’ve seen over the past year, but I think they are in a very difficult situation at present and they really are ‘following the science’ as we understand it at present.
Israeli data suggests double-dosing works. There is no hint of a vaccine effect as yet in the UK. Your claims are, I think, unsubstantiated in that case. That I can see no credible scientists thinks this government is now following the science and independent Sage is having a nightmare because things are so bad. Sage itself is little better.
I’m not making claims one way or the other. I’m just pointing out that we can’t expect the data to be available as it is now becoming in Israel who are further ahead in their vaccination programme than us, are using a different vaccine for most of the doses they’ve given and are following a different protocol with different aims (other than the obvious aim of reducing loss of life). In my previous post in one of your comment threads from last week, I mentioned that I would expect indications of how well the UK vaccination programme is progressing should hopefully be available around the end of this month. As I mentioned, however, if B.1.1.7 is more virulent as they now think, then deaths will be higher than they would have been without its emergence, though hopefully not in the population who have had 1 dose of a vaccine and then time for an immune response to develop.
This is where the difficulties in data collection really begin. Ideally, we would need to know how many people have caught Covid once a 3 week period after the first dose has elapsed, what proportion of these have had which variants (‘Classic’ Covid, B.1.1.7 or even B.1.1.7 + E484K mutation), how many of these patients have been ill enough to require hospital treatment, if their outcomes are worse than the unvaccinated in their cohort during this wave of infections and then, preferably all of the above for both the AZ and Pfizer vaccines! That is a lot of data and most of it won’t exist, especially as nowhere near every genome is sequenced.
There’s no doubt that the emergence of B.1.1.7 led to a rethink of the vaccination process in the UK, but it was the JCVI, not the government, which recommended spacing the doses to hopefully provide enough protection to as many people as possible. It was an educated gamble which probably wouldn’t have occurred if we’d only been dealing with the ‘classic’ Covid variants, but we’re not. We’ve been guessing our way through this whole pandemic and there is still much to be learned about transmission and the effectiveness of the vaccines. The fact that the WHO is now recommending a similar process with the AZ vaccine makes me hope that there is enough data behind the scenes to indicate it was the correct choice.
In the best of worlds, we’d have followed the trial process when rolling out the vaccines but there simply aren’t enough doses of the Pfizer (or Moderna) vaccines around to duplicate the Israeli trial in any decent-sized country so we’ve got to work with what we’ve got. Hopefully, the educated gamble will pay off.
The EU is not doi9ng what we are doing
And I very strongly suspect will win as a result
I am sorry, but your apology for the government is not accepted by me
This still feels like a policy of democide to me
There’s a lot of relevant information here;
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-vaccine-adverse-reactions/coronavirus-vaccine-summary-of-yellow-card-reporting
But not what I am asking for – that does not exist
I understand yellow cards – they are notified side effects (and any doctor can report) but they are not what I asked for
Throughout this pandemic thereb has been a campaign of misinformation by BoJo & Co. English infection & death rates have been systematically hidden amongst numbers for the UK in almost all reporting.
Has anyone seen the current comparisons of death rates in the press or BBC: England 1,840 deaths per million versus Scotland 1,229 deaths per million. Both started with the same rates last spring and then governments deviated in their management.
Also England being miles ahead of the rest of the UK in vaccination rates nmade the news for weeks. They ignored scientific advice and skipped the elderly in care settings so now have double the death rate in this group. Then they started giving numbers for people “offerred” vaccination or settings “vissited” re vaccination. How can the BBC and press just allow taht without further question. Now on looking a little closer it seems that current vaccination rates are: Wales 24.9%, Scotland 23.0% and England 22.9% of total population. It’s not quite clear if all the English cases were vaccinated or offered vaccines or merely visited. Again nothing from the media to reflect the current situation after weeks of criticising the Scottish govcernment “falling behind” on vaccination.
The problem in the UK is not just having a psychopathis government but how they are supported by the media, Where does one start turning this around other than the obvious solution for Scotland.
Vaccination is for the benefit of populations, and future populations. If you are concerned about individual risk, then the data will tell you that it is vanishingly small.
Why worry at all then?
But fir the record, I was referring to population risk
I want t9 understand efficacy and that is measured in populations
We know that following the vaccination regime that was actually tested – two doses, three weeks apart – should achieve a good level of protection. That is what we are seeing in Israel.
We also know that locking down the country is the only thing that has worked to date get infections, hospitalisations and deaths under control. Things went slowly out of control last September, and worse in October, and then careened away again in December. That is an expensive lesson that has a price counted in ill health and death, and also impacts on economics and mental health and many other things. And we’ve had to incur that cost three times due to our government’s actions and inactions. Each week of delay is thousands, probably tens of thousands, of extra deaths. Three times.
We can be pretty sure that one dose will be less effective than two doses at the approved intervals. We are not really sure how much less effective but we have (literally) millions of people who’ve been vaccinated for over a month – 3.5 million people on 15 January. So how are we doing? Where is the date and the evidence?
So we are still gambling – without much good evidence, but with high hopes and analogies to how vaccines and viruses “should” behave – that injecting twice as many people with one dose will be more effective (in population terms) than giving one half full protection and the other half no protection. Or to put it another way, we weaken the protection of the most vulnerable groups to reach the next tiers of vulnerability more quickly. If two doses gets one person 60% protection, is that better or worse than two people getting 40% protection from one dose each? What if it is 60% versus 30% or less twice? How many people have had which vaccine? What is the breakdown of deaths in each of the the last six weeks in age cohorts?
This is one hell of a way to conduct a medical experiment. Was an ethics committee consulted?
Thanks
I agree
I’m sorry if the data you want are not available, but I don’t see overall reason to doubt that its vaccination programme is one of the UK’s few significant successes during the pandemic. This article – https://edition.cnn.com/2021/02/15/europe/uk-vaccine-rollout-target-gbr-intl/index.html – confirms this while sharing my – and your -distrust or dislike of our government in general. Looking at probably the most authoritative data source – ECDC – the EU have just about reached administration of 20m doses (less than 5% of population) , compared with about 15m in England (about 25%).
As Mariner described, the complications of different virus strains, vaccines and number of doses, and the limitations of data gathering, make it impossible to give precise estimates of their relative risks at this early stage of vaccination rollout.
An interesting current scientific question is whether having ones second dose of a different vaccine (“mosaic vaccination”) might be better than two of the same.
You need to appreciate that in past epidemics the data gathering and scientific analysis took months or years; it’s impressive that scientists are now getting out good quality papers in weeks.
As to personal risk, the strong evidence is that all the approved vaccines reduce risk, and the severity of diease if caught, significanty but not entirely. That’s why I would like to see incidence brought much lower before we lift lockdown. But I do feel safer (or wil do after 2 or 3 weeks) from having my first dose today.
Stay safe, and please carry on criticising the government on all the many things it does get wrong!
I acknowledge I may be wrong. More importantly, I acknowledge that the epidemiologists and virologists may be wrong, but excepting those on the government payroll they seem to share my concern.
And the concern is well placed. The government now calls a single dose of the vaccine ‘vaccination’. It is not. Two doses are required. The second they now call a ‘booster’. It is not.
What you are praising is the success of the governments political programme, and nit its vaccination programme. Add this so-called programme to the resumption of mass transmission exercises from 8 March and the next wave Lois to be on its way.
How can that be considered a success?
It is quite possible that the government’s approach is a resounding success. The numbers we really want (how effectively single shot of the vaccine is at preventing infection, preventing transmission, and preventing serious symptoms or death) will be hard to calculate with any accuracy. But given the millions of people who have been vaccinated, and the thousands who have been hospitalised or died, it should be possible to give some basic numbers. We must know how many of each vaccine have been administered. We must know how many people (who have have already been vaccinated) have subsequently been hospitalised or died, compared to those who have not. We can do some basic number crunching to see if the numbers are responding to increasing vaccination rates, tier by tier. What has been happening in care homes, in the 80+, 75-80 and 70-75 groups? That is something like 3.5, 2.5 and 3.5 million people. If we worked methodically down the tiers we should have done most of the first by about 15 January (four weeks ago), the second by about about 23 January (three weeks ago) and the third by about 1 February (two weeks ago). We should be able to see the vaccine working to deliver increased resistance in real time. Can we see differences between groups that are not vaccinated versus those vaccinated one, two or there or more weeks ago? Unless of course the effects of a single dose in elderly people is rather less dramatic than we hoped.
The suggestion that the effect of the vaccine on case numbers is not yet obvious to the eye suggests that any impact to date is marginal to negligible. Which is not to say we should not vaccinate. But we do need to see the evidence and do it properly, in a way that actually works to deliver disease resistance, rather than just clapping and cheering an ever increasing rate of shots in arms.
You completely get my reasoning
And one issue with “tolerating” tens of thousands of new infections every day, amid a population where a quarter of people have some vaccination protection, some more might have some resistance from previous infections, and the rest have none, is that you are creating the conditions where new variants can emerge that might defeat the resistance.
Here we go again: Another new coronavirus variant seen in the UK. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-56082573
“. Instead we have left these people with partial protection for weeks and weeks while we started vaccinating groups with lower risk.”
I suspect we will only see the full effect of the vaccination program when we do start to vaccinate younger people. Their bodies are more likely to generate the necessary antibodies to give good immunity. The concerns of some governments about the lack of testing on older patients are almost certainly valid.
It would have been a hard argument to sell, but, applying some lateral thinking, it could be that our best approach was to vaccinate the younger and more socially irresponsible age groups first. Not because they are at high risk themselves but to protect those who they otherwise might go on to infect.
‘It also supports the policy recommendation made by the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) for a 12-week prime-boost interval, as they look for the optimal approach to roll out, and reassures us that people are protected from 22 days after a single dose of the vaccine.’
The exploratory analyses presented in this preprint suggest that it is the dosing interval and not the dosing level which has a great impact on the efficacy of the vaccine. This is in line with previous research supporting greater efficacy with longer prime-boost intervals done with other vaccines such as influenza, Ebola and malaria.
https://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2021-02-02-oxford-coronavirus-vaccine-shows-sustained-protection-76-during-3-month-interval#
You might be right, Martin: the vaccine will probably be more effective in younger people who need it less, but you can see the imperative to protect first the older groups most at risk of dying. But I’ve seen some evidence (admittedly on small numbers) to raise concerns that a significant percentage of older people might have muted responses to one vaccination, but much stronger reactions on the second vaccination within three weeks. If the first shot has a small reaction, then perhaps the second shot might have a small reaction too if you leave too long a gap, and you’ll miss out on all the benefit that two shots closer together would have provided.
But, look, millions of people have received single shots. There must be *some* evidence, either that it is working or that it isn’t. The fact that none is being presented suggests any signal is weak at best.
Precisely
Also what are the UK covid vaccines stock levels. Where is the chart?
I am an ex nurse so know how important it is to follow the delivery of drugs to the letter . You don’t stop a course of antibiotics before the end. I was horrified that immediately the first doses of the Pfizer vaccine were administered the government decided it would ignore the findings of the Pfizer trials and not give the second dose 21 days after. The WHO and the BMJ both adhered to the advice of Pfizer. Our government decided they knew better . I was offered a vaccine far earlier than I should have been and when I was told it was Pfizer and the second dose would be administered 12 weeks later, I declined and said I would wait. I have since had numerous conversations with medical people all of whom have understood my concerns about the 12 weeks between doses . It is not the NHS who are making this decision it is the government. From past experience we know they chose the experts to ask to suit their policies. I am not anti vaccine , but I will not put something in my body when I am not sure fully of the outcome. The most honest thing the government has said is . We don’t know the vaccine will stop you getting COVID but it should stop you dying. We don’t know it will stop you infecting others so keep your distance and don’t socialize. I think I have already had the virus a year ago and because there has been no research on natural antibodies, no one can say whether natural immunity is as good as a vaccine. I am happy to wait for a while as I am not going anywhere and am not as at risk as so many younger people working on the front line in Sll our public services. I agree with you Richard we are not being given proper data but maybe because it isn’t being collected. The government just wanted to win at something and the roll out of the vaccine is their prize. As usual they have nit done it properly. What a shambles.
Thanks
Each person needs to make their own choice, of course, but I would encourage anyone who is offered a vaccine to take it. There is clear evidence that both of the vaccines that are being delivered are safe (very few bad reactions) and they almost certainly have at least some protective effect. The question is how much effect, and whether unproven but undoubtedly reduced effect for more people is better or worse than the proven effect for fewer people.
To put this in context, 15 million doses could have been used to vaccinate all of the 6 million people aged 75 and over twice already, and those aged 70-75 once with a second dose by the end of this month. Instead we have left these people with partial protection for weeks and weeks while we started vaccinating groups with lower risk.
I agree with all that
“The government just wanted to win at something and the roll out of the vaccine is their prize.”
Yes, I agree. Given the level of corruption, incompetence and lying Johnson’s administration has been engaged in, the vaccination program’s ‘success’ is exactly that. A media ‘win’. It’s possible Richard is wrong, and the strategy of giving a single dose to as many people as possible rather than the double dose to fewer will work, and be proved to have been justified.
But even if it is, it’ll be the only thing they’ve got right. Proper Track and Trace? No thanks, we’ll give £22 billion(!!!!!!!) to a private sector shambles led by a woman who ****** up at Talk Talk, and who got the job because she knew Hancock through their mutual membership of the Jockey club. PPE procurement? No, we’ll hand out huge contracts to Tory party donors and personal friends regardless of their experience of such, and then hide behind the excuse of being in a pandemic emergency. A prompt lockdown when news first emerged of Covid? Don’t be silly! Proper checks on international travellers coming into the country from day1, like NZ and Australia? Of course not.
So I’ll take the success of this program with a pinch of salt for now. Actually, how much credit do they deserve even for this? Surely the speed of the program is down to public sector bodies like the NHS, the Armed Forces, helped by large numbers of the public volunteering. A collective, NOT a private effort. And what produced the
So given Johnson’s track record, I’ll be staying put until I’ve had the 2 doses.
I was on abuilding site last week snagging some properties my Council employer is purchasing to use them as social housing.
No one working on the site was a wearing a face mask and I was made fun of for doing so. I’ve complained to the people managing the purchase and also to my own H&S team.
So far I’ve had no reaction at all. I feel compromised because I could quite rightly refuse to go on site again to accept the development.
I know that Boris & Co are completely remiss, but so too are the people who just don’t take these things seriously. And there’s plenty of them.
The 1-dose strategy is indeed a break from precedent, and needs sceptical examination, but so far the evidence is that it’s a good strategy – see recent papers on the two main vaccines used in the UK below.
I don’t see how you can think I am “praising the success of the governments political programme” – most of which I am bitterly opposed to, and I am generaally very critical of their pandemic management: you may well be right in anticipating that their next error will be to ease up lockdown too soon.
But I am also committed to acknowledging facts, including:
– the vaccine delivery programme has been a success by international standards – https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/world/covid-vaccinations-tracker.html – for which credit goes at least as much to NHS staff as to government;
– the current evidence is that the 1-dose strategy makes good sense …
Astra-Zeneca – (Lancet, 1 Feb 2021) –
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3777268
“Interpretation: ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 vaccination programmes aimed at vaccinating a large proportion of the population with a single dose, with a second dose given after a 3 month period is an effective strategy for reducing disease, and may be the optimal for rollout of a pandemic vaccine when supplies are limited in the short term.”
Pfizer – (MedArxiv, 1 Feb 2021) –
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.02.01.21250957v1
” … What our analysis shows is that a single dose of vaccine is highly protective, although it can take up to 21 days to achieve this. The early results coming from Israel support the UK policy of extending the gap between doses by showing that a single dose can give a high level of protection.”
Let’s see
I think you and the sycophants writing this stuff will end up with considerable egg on your face
Of course I could be wrong, but every serious epidemiologist seems to be profoundly worried about this programme
This is a fog and we don’t have enough data to call anything one way or another for sure. But is does seem to me the govt is being rather shrill over the vaccination figures, so it that it looks to me like it is is pushing the only positive story it has for every last ounce of credit it can get out of it. I thus take the vaccination rate hype with a certain suspicious.
I do agree completely with the Government’s hiding of the figures but would like to point out that it’s worth noting the BBC news item
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/55800921
On the Israeli vaccinations.
Thank you Richard for writing this post and raising very legitimate concerns. All you are asking for is more independent data and proper monitoring of the whole picture so we can learn for the future of how to handle a future pandemic more effectively. The UK government sure got it wrong every step of the way and have only been baled out by the production of vaccines. The AstraZeneca vaccine does not belong to the UK or the government. They only put some money upfront to secure a number of doses, and even then probably not enough. It was trialed to have 12 weeks between doses – Pfizer was not, so there is no data available on Pfizer to support any claims that longer than 21 days is effective. I heard Prof. Pollard answering questions on a talk show and he was very evasive about certain questions about autoimmunity. Rather like a politician.
It remains to be seen how it could have been handled differently. To decide that you would have to know why the govt handled it as they did. Even now, more than 12 months into the pandemic, this country is still allowing international travel. The hotels to handle that traffic for the wait period are still not operating properly, and staff are not being given the correct PPE anyway.
Now, this is a modern, highly technological society, with a modern health system. The politicians are well-educated. The civil service personnel are highly educated, the outside advisors are highly educated. The advice they are given is by people whose skill will include handling of infectious diseases.
I find it extremely worrying that people still think that the entire govt machine went asleep at the start of 2020, and has not yet woken-up.
Sorry: I don’t think that is a viable explanation.
The vast majority of those who died as a result of this pandemic are in groups the govt has little interest in. I’ll leave it there.
The antibody count for 80+ is interesting…
“The percentage of the people in England aged 80 years and over testing positive for antibodies was 40.9%. This age group was prioritised for vaccination. However, the figures only include those who live in private households, not care homes”
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/conditionsanddiseases/articles/coronaviruscovid19roundup/2020-03-26
The deputy CSO told p[arliament today that there is no evidence of a vaccine effect so far
No wonder she is not rolled out very often
So 49% of over 80s’ must have had covid….
Richard,
Not words I thought I would ever use – on this issue I think you are wrong and the Government is right.
I spent my working life as a research scientist (studying mutation!) and science has its own particular culture. If a scientist is ever found to have lied, their career is finished. Even an honest mistake does great harm. This makes a scientist very unwilling to speak until they are completely sure. COVID has pushed both scientists and politicians far outside their comfort zones. Viruses do not listen to politicians, and scientists have been forced to make recommendations without adequate data. The normal rules of caution do not apply and some scientists and expert committees have found this harder to cope with than others.
On balance of probabilities, I think the decision to increase the spacing of doses was correct. Jonathan Van Tam put it very simply. If two doses give 90% protection, and one dose gives 45% protection, then giving two people one dose each, or one person two doses is equal. If the first dose gives more than half the protection, then vaccinating more people is the better option. It is not a pure guess, small-scale studies suggest that one dose will give significant antibody levels in 2-3 weeks.
In science (or economics) to be sure of something you need both a plausible mechanism and the numbers. You may need to take decisions on one or the other, but you can’t be sure you are right. The plausible mechanism for increasing spacing is there, and I would have taken the same decision, but there is always a chance it could have been wrong. Avoiding a certainty of a bad outcome against the probability of a better outcome and the possibility of a worse one.
Denis Mollison, Jonathan and Mariner are correct, and the data that you want on the vaccine cannot be there yet. If it was mid January before there was sufficient vaccination to make a measurable difference, and if it takes about two weeks for a measurable protective effect, you are up to early February. Playing with the numbers, I find that a change in the number of weekly deaths correlates best with the change in weekly number of cases about 3 weeks earlier. The success or failure of vaccination should only starting to become clear at the end of February or beginning of March.
You would predict that vaccinating vulnerable groups would have a greater effect on deaths than on new cases. It is too early to say, but there is just a hint this first indicator may be starting to show.
Senior government officials said there was no evidence of a vaccine effect showing as yet yesterday
We are going to have to disagree on this
I may be wrong, but I think we are seeing lockdown effects and different behavioural responses to it – with the old being more compliant