New Vaccine 90% Effective!

[Manforallseasons]

Pfizer says early analysis shows its Covid-19 vaccine is 90% effective

[Moses]

Pfizer says early analysis shows its Covid-19 vaccine is 90% effective

That means at least 8 of 94 vaccinated patients got COVID-19.

PRO:
- such effectiveness has potential to lower level of covid-sickness 2-3 times (why not 9? because vaccinated person will lose caution and will catch COVID more often than non-vaccinated if count per 1000 persons)
- world economy will recover more quickly

CONST: low probability to lift travel restrictions until 60-70% of humanity will be vaccinated (at least 2-3 years).

[StevieWonders]

On the contrary 90% effective means that 90% developed antibodies. These vaccines while tested in some populations where COVID-19 is present have not been tested extensively by deliberately exposing people who’ve been vaccinated to COVID-19.

[Zebedee]

Still sounds like good news, hopefully its the breakthrough we've all been waiting for!

[Up2U]

This was the breaking news article from THE NY Times....

Pfizer’s Early Data Shows Vaccine Is More Than 90% Effective https://nyti.ms/35eBHY9

[Moses]

On the contrary 90% effective means that 90% developed antibodies.

No. It means exactly what I wrote: "8 from 94". Because you may have antibodies and still got COVID if/when you will meet another kind (stamm?) of COVID-19 virus, or if level of antibodies in your blood will be too low to meet virus's agression.

Also about "8 of 94" proof:

90% effectiveness implies that no more than 8 of the 94 people who caught COVID-19 had been given the vaccine, which was administered in two shots about three weeks apart.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-h...-idUSKBN27P1CT

[goji]

Moses is correct. The Pfizer press release clearly shows the judgement is based on infection numbers. Nowhere does it mention judgement based on antibodies.
I suspect the numbers are about right too, as 90% effectiveness and 94 infections presumably means approx 86 in the placebo group and 8 in the vaccine group.

Here's the original Pfizer press release.

https://investors.pfizer.com/investo...y/default.aspx

[Moses]

Here is WHO "vaccines landscape list", November3.
https://www.who.int/docs/default-sou...f02369d152.pdf

Shortly: right now only 10 vaccines are on trial phase 3 (last): 4 from China, 1 from Russia, 1 from Germany, 1 from UK and 3 from USA. Most of developers will publish first results in November (3-4 months should be enough for to collect fist bunch of data).

[Nirish guy]

So, excuse my naivety here perhaps but if one ( or a few) of the above Companies "cracks it" and develops a working vaccine I assume that no one Company can make enough vaccine fast enough to make any real dent in things ?

If so is the plan then for that Company to give / sell / licence out the "recipe" to all the other manufacturing Companies so that a working vaccine can be is distributed right around the world just as quickly as possible? Or is the plan more of that it's just "whatever" Countries that placed their bet / orders with that lucky Company WILL now be first in the queue for vaccine and all the other Countries will just to have to wait ?

I'm assuming also that this then is why Pzifer announced today that DIDNT take any of the USA's development grant funds when offered and its not perhaps so much a case of them wishing to be seen to be "independent" (as they claimed today), but more a case of them planning that IF they successful that they could then name their price and or sell to the highest bidder/s and in doing so the make WAY more than any "development grant" funds that was offered initially ?

[goji]

So, excuse my naivety here perhaps but if one ( or a few) of the above Companies "cracks it" and develops a working vaccine I assume that no one Company can make enough vaccine fast enough to make any real dent in things ?

If so is the plan then for that Company to give / sell / licence out the "recipe" to all the other manufacturing Companies so that a working vaccine can be is distributed right around the world just as quickly as possible? Or is the plan more of that it's just "whatever" Countries that placed their bet / orders with that lucky Company WILL now be first in the queue for vaccine and all the other Countries will just to have to wait ?

Pfizer supposedly can make about 1.5 billion vaccines before the end of 2021. Which at 2 doses per person would vaccinate 10% of the world's population, ~ 700 million.

From a self interest point of view, it then depends on which 700 million. The UK government has bought 40 million doses, so they could do 20 million people.
The provisional UK priority list for people to get vaccinated is here: https://www.gov.uk/government/public...19-vaccination

By a quick calculation, there are approximately 25 million people over 50. So if we include all the other people on the priority list, 20 million vaccines will NOT stretch far enough to cover people in their early 50s, unless there are a significant percentage of higher priority people who decline the offer of a vaccine.

The UK government has also bought doses of the Astra Zeneca Oxford vaccine and other vaccine candidates (total ~300 million doses across all vaccines). Also, contracts have been signed for the manufacture & distribution of this vaccine in a number of other countries, including Thailand, Australia & from memory, also Russia, India, US, Brazil. Probably others.

I suspect poorer countries in Africa etc will be waiting longer. I'm not saying that's how it should be, but more how it is likely to be.
Fortunately many poor countries also have very low median ages, so the death rate will be much lower anyway. Also, there is funding for some supply to these countries (eventually).