"She says that up to 31 March, 20m doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine were given and 79 cases of rare blood clots were reported.
All 79 cases occured after the first dose and 19 people sadly died, Raine says.
Of the cases, 51 were women and 28 men aged 18 to 79 years old.
She said the risk of this kind of side effect was about four in one million to those who receive the vaccine."
19 out of 20m I make just under 1 in a million deaths or roughly 5 deaths in Scotland where there are currently 7,614 registered Covid deaths.
When did we earn the right to live in a world without risk? The world has genuinely gone potty. Do people have no concept of risk assessment? I am going for my jab on Monday. If its AZ that will be absolutely fine. Of course if I do turn out to be one of the 5 I will be disappointed.
Yes, it's batshit once you factor in the extra downside of booming anti-vaxxery, it makes no sense on a risk-benefit analysis. I've taken multiple medicines that must have had a 1 in 100,000 risk of death or higher
So, either they know something and they're not telling us, OR they have gone mad.
Ergo, this decision is so silly it is tempting me into mad anti-vax beliefs (I shall resist, but you see the point)
Twats
Or you can't do maths or science.
If a vaccine at low prevalence gives you a 1/100,000 risk of death - and being unvaccinated gives you a 1% higher of getting infected and a 1/2,500 chance of dying if you are, then should you be vaccinated?
williamglenn is right. The presumption of low exposure in the UK is crap, as well. What if Covid comes back, then we are all high exposure again. And suddenly not giving AZ to the yoof is idiotic, even by the maths
This is a pile of pants decision made by a scientific cabal which is crapping itself about some future inquiry and doesn't understand how most people think. Or, to use the parlance, they are exercising an overabundance of caution
Sigh
Almost no-one (statistically) in the 29-18 group is getting jabbed at the moment. The numbers that are, can easily be handled with another vaccine.
By the time we get to 29- groups, we will have, almost certainly, large quantities of other vaccines.
BTW, back on an envelope, I think the UK needs to put another 60M jabs in arms to get to 90% of the adult population having had both doses.
Do we know which vaccines are intended to make up that 60M? Presumably we are close to using up all our Pfizer order.
Around 26m of our 40m Pfizer doses are either jabbed or spoken for, we've got 17m Moderna and 60m Novavax coming. Under 50s will predominantly be getting the remainder of the Pfizer doses, Moderna or Novavax.
Novavax looks like the real MVP for us right now and Moderna a good bridging vaccine until we get volume deliveries of it.
I'm not sure these graphs showing the risk during a 16 week period are very helpful. They give a wrongly inflated view of the risks from the vaccine.
Needs a politician to say "we can't stay locked down forever" so pay attention to those high exposure figures.
The 'low exposure risk' graph implied the risk from the vaccine was higher than the risk from covid, which is an absurd misrepresentation. We know covid isn't going to go away so they should assume that people will be exposed to covid at some point and base the risk/benefit profile on that.
Completely disagreed. It isn't misrepresented since Covid is going away, we won't all be exposed to Covid at some point - we'll be able to get an alternative vaccine at some point, or simply not be exposed to the virus ourselves. Yes the virus will still be there, but it won't get everyone, like HIV or other viruses.
This is the slide I'm talking about. It implies that the risk from the vaccination is greater than the risk from covid for 20-29 year olds, but it's based on them having a low risk of being exposed to it. This is disastrous messaging because it will encourage people not to get vaccinated at all.
Hang on, the "every 16 weeks" disclaimer means they aren't exactly comparing like with like...
It is going to be a 'low exposure risk' for a lot longer than that, surely.
No because everyone ought to be able to get access to an alternative vaccine within 16 weeks.
Ah, true, assuming this doesn't put people off completely. Does that mean they are assuming a 16 week delay, then? I do hope not.
I also hope the alternative vaccine doesn't turn out to have the same issues. Then what?
No actually they're saying there won't be any delay.
I'm not sure these graphs showing the risk during a 16 week period are very helpful. They give a wrongly inflated view of the risks from the vaccine.
Needs a politician to say "we can't stay locked down forever" so pay attention to those high exposure figures.
The 'low exposure risk' graph implied the risk from the vaccine was higher than the risk from covid, which is an absurd misrepresentation. We know covid isn't going to go away so they should assume that people will be exposed to covid at some point and base the risk/benefit profile on that.
Completely disagreed. It isn't misrepresented since Covid is going away, we won't all be exposed to Covid at some point - we'll be able to get an alternative vaccine at some point, or simply not be exposed to the virus ourselves. Yes the virus will still be there, but it won't get everyone, like HIV or other viruses.
This is the slide I'm talking about. It implies that the risk from the vaccination is greater than the risk from covid for 20-29 year olds, but it's based on them having a low risk of being exposed to it. This is disastrous messaging because it will encourage people not to get vaccinated at all.
Hang on, the "every 16 weeks" disclaimer means they aren't exactly comparing like with like...
It is going to be a 'low exposure risk' for a lot longer than that, surely.
No because everyone ought to be able to get access to an alternative vaccine within 16 weeks.
This is a valid point, but there's no need to present information in a way that will make people think they don't need to get vaccinated.
They haven't. The MRHA has suggested a different vaccination in that sub-group.
They put a slide on national TV showing that the risk of the vaccine was greater than the risk from covid. A lot of people won't bother trying to understand the nuances and will just think that they'd be better off taking their chances.
"She says that up to 31 March, 20m doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine were given and 79 cases of rare blood clots were reported.
All 79 cases occured after the first dose and 19 people sadly died, Raine says.
Of the cases, 51 were women and 28 men aged 18 to 79 years old.
She said the risk of this kind of side effect was about four in one million to those who receive the vaccine."
19 out of 20m I make just under 1 in a million deaths or roughly 5 deaths in Scotland where there are currently 7,614 registered Covid deaths.
When did we earn the right to live in a world without risk? The world has genuinely gone potty. Do people have no concept of risk assessment? I am going for my jab on Monday. If its AZ that will be absolutely fine. Of course if I do turn out to be one of the 5 I will be disappointed.
Yes, it's batshit once you factor in the extra downside of booming anti-vaxxery, it makes no sense on a risk-benefit analysis. I've taken multiple medicines that must have had a 1 in 100,000 risk of death or higher
So, either they know something and they're not telling us, OR they have gone mad.
Ergo, this decision is so silly it is tempting me into mad anti-vax beliefs (I shall resist, but you see the point)
Twats
Or you can't do maths or science.
If a vaccine at low prevalence gives you a 1/100,000 risk of death - and being unvaccinated gives you a 1% higher of getting infected and a 1/2,500 chance of dying if you are, then should you be vaccinated?
williamglenn is right. The presumption of low exposure in the UK is crap, as well. What if Covid comes back, then we are all high exposure again. And suddenly not giving AZ to the yoof is idiotic, even by the maths
This is a pile of pants decision made by a scientific cabal which is crapping itself about some future inquiry and doesn't understand how most people think. Or, to use the parlance, they are exercising an overabundance of caution
Sigh
Almost no-one (statistically) in the 29-18 group is getting jabbed at the moment. The numbers that are, can easily be handled with another vaccine.
By the time we get to 29- groups, we will have, almost certainly, large quantities of other vaccines.
BTW, back on an envelope, I think the UK needs to put another 60M jabs in arms to get to 90% of the adult population having had both doses.
Do we know which vaccines are intended to make up that 60M? Presumably we are close to using up all our Pfizer order.
Around 26m of our 40m Pfizer doses are either jabbed or spoken for, we've got 17m Moderna and 60m Novavax coming. Under 50s will predominantly be getting the remainder of the Pfizer doses, Moderna or Novavax.
Novavax looks like the real MVP for us right now and Moderna a good bridging vaccine until we get volume deliveries of it.
We're currently going through ~2.5m doses per week though aren't we? More last month.
I'm not sure these graphs showing the risk during a 16 week period are very helpful. They give a wrongly inflated view of the risks from the vaccine.
Needs a politician to say "we can't stay locked down forever" so pay attention to those high exposure figures.
The 'low exposure risk' graph implied the risk from the vaccine was higher than the risk from covid, which is an absurd misrepresentation. We know covid isn't going to go away so they should assume that people will be exposed to covid at some point and base the risk/benefit profile on that.
Completely disagreed. It isn't misrepresented since Covid is going away, we won't all be exposed to Covid at some point - we'll be able to get an alternative vaccine at some point, or simply not be exposed to the virus ourselves. Yes the virus will still be there, but it won't get everyone, like HIV or other viruses.
This is the slide I'm talking about. It implies that the risk from the vaccination is greater than the risk from covid for 20-29 year olds, but it's based on them having a low risk of being exposed to it. This is disastrous messaging because it will encourage people not to get vaccinated at all.
Hang on, the "every 16 weeks" disclaimer means they aren't exactly comparing like with like...
It is going to be a 'low exposure risk' for a lot longer than that, surely.
No because everyone ought to be able to get access to an alternative vaccine within 16 weeks.
Ah, true, assuming this doesn't put people off completely. Does that mean they are assuming a 16 week delay, then? I do hope not.
I also hope the alternative vaccine doesn't turn out to have the same issues. Then what?
Or, we see a new mutation, or the Brazilian variant, or - as you say - Pfizer has similar issues (and there are already rumours out there)
The simplest thing would have been this: admit that Yes, there are very rare side effects, but say: we will carry on vaccinating, as the risk to the whole country of non vaccination is far greater than the risks of any jab itself. Which is entirely true
It's 1 in 100,000 FFS, or maybe even 1 in 1,000,000
I'm not sure these graphs showing the risk during a 16 week period are very helpful. They give a wrongly inflated view of the risks from the vaccine.
Needs a politician to say "we can't stay locked down forever" so pay attention to those high exposure figures.
The 'low exposure risk' graph implied the risk from the vaccine was higher than the risk from covid, which is an absurd misrepresentation. We know covid isn't going to go away so they should assume that people will be exposed to covid at some point and base the risk/benefit profile on that.
Completely disagreed. It isn't misrepresented since Covid is going away, we won't all be exposed to Covid at some point - we'll be able to get an alternative vaccine at some point, or simply not be exposed to the virus ourselves. Yes the virus will still be there, but it won't get everyone, like HIV or other viruses.
This is the slide I'm talking about. It implies that the risk from the vaccination is greater than the risk from covid for 20-29 year olds, but it's based on them having a low risk of being exposed to it. This is disastrous messaging because it will encourage people not to get vaccinated at all.
Hang on, the "every 16 weeks" disclaimer means they aren't exactly comparing like with like...
It is going to be a 'low exposure risk' for a lot longer than that, surely.
No because everyone ought to be able to get access to an alternative vaccine within 16 weeks.
This is a valid point, but there's no need to present information in a way that will make people think they don't need to get vaccinated.
They haven't. The MRHA has suggested a different vaccination in that sub-group.
They put a slide on national TV showing that the risk of the vaccine was greater than the risk from covid. A lot of people won't bother trying to understand the nuances and will just think that they'd be better off taking their chances.
Do you think our MHRA should have been less honest ?
I'm not sure these graphs showing the risk during a 16 week period are very helpful. They give a wrongly inflated view of the risks from the vaccine.
Needs a politician to say "we can't stay locked down forever" so pay attention to those high exposure figures.
The 'low exposure risk' graph implied the risk from the vaccine was higher than the risk from covid, which is an absurd misrepresentation. We know covid isn't going to go away so they should assume that people will be exposed to covid at some point and base the risk/benefit profile on that.
Completely disagreed. It isn't misrepresented since Covid is going away, we won't all be exposed to Covid at some point - we'll be able to get an alternative vaccine at some point, or simply not be exposed to the virus ourselves. Yes the virus will still be there, but it won't get everyone, like HIV or other viruses.
This is the slide I'm talking about. It implies that the risk from the vaccination is greater than the risk from covid for 20-29 year olds, but it's based on them having a low risk of being exposed to it. This is disastrous messaging because it will encourage people not to get vaccinated at all.
Hang on, the "every 16 weeks" disclaimer means they aren't exactly comparing like with like...
It is going to be a 'low exposure risk' for a lot longer than that, surely.
No because everyone ought to be able to get access to an alternative vaccine within 16 weeks.
This is a valid point, but there's no need to present information in a way that will make people think they don't need to get vaccinated.
They haven't. The MRHA has suggested a different vaccination in that sub-group.
They put a slide on national TV showing that the risk of the vaccine was greater than the risk from covid. A lot of people won't bother trying to understand the nuances and will just think that they'd be better off taking their chances.
If that's the fact should it be hidden and let others show it instead?
I'm not sure these graphs showing the risk during a 16 week period are very helpful. They give a wrongly inflated view of the risks from the vaccine.
Needs a politician to say "we can't stay locked down forever" so pay attention to those high exposure figures.
The 'low exposure risk' graph implied the risk from the vaccine was higher than the risk from covid, which is an absurd misrepresentation. We know covid isn't going to go away so they should assume that people will be exposed to covid at some point and base the risk/benefit profile on that.
Completely disagreed. It isn't misrepresented since Covid is going away, we won't all be exposed to Covid at some point - we'll be able to get an alternative vaccine at some point, or simply not be exposed to the virus ourselves. Yes the virus will still be there, but it won't get everyone, like HIV or other viruses.
This is the slide I'm talking about. It implies that the risk from the vaccination is greater than the risk from covid for 20-29 year olds, but it's based on them having a low risk of being exposed to it. This is disastrous messaging because it will encourage people not to get vaccinated at all.
Yes, trying to adjust the figures for likelihood of exposure is ridiculous.
They should just have stuck with the liklihood of death by covid or death by vaccine for the age range chart.
I'm not sure these graphs showing the risk during a 16 week period are very helpful. They give a wrongly inflated view of the risks from the vaccine.
Needs a politician to say "we can't stay locked down forever" so pay attention to those high exposure figures.
The 'low exposure risk' graph implied the risk from the vaccine was higher than the risk from covid, which is an absurd misrepresentation. We know covid isn't going to go away so they should assume that people will be exposed to covid at some point and base the risk/benefit profile on that.
Completely disagreed. It isn't misrepresented since Covid is going away, we won't all be exposed to Covid at some point - we'll be able to get an alternative vaccine at some point, or simply not be exposed to the virus ourselves. Yes the virus will still be there, but it won't get everyone, like HIV or other viruses.
This is the slide I'm talking about. It implies that the risk from the vaccination is greater than the risk from covid for 20-29 year olds, but it's based on them having a low risk of being exposed to it. This is disastrous messaging because it will encourage people not to get vaccinated at all.
It's tricky. They are trying to present the absolute risks in a way understandable. But the absolute risk is a function of the baseline risk in the population which in turn is a function of the prevalence of vaccination. Given that the decision for under-30s is now conditional on baseline risk, it is a correct representation of the decision. But it is misleading because the risk from Covid is not just about ICU.
Of course. And to give it further context, the all risks chance of anyone in the 25-30yr age range dying in a twelve month period in normal times in the UK is, I think, somewhere around 40 per 100,000. So the absolute risk from this vaccine, even if the effect is proven, is pretty small.
But the principle with all medicines is that you do not give them unless there is a clear net benefit. There probably still is for the AZN vaccine, even in the younger cohort, but it is a marginal benefit, so given the existence of alternative vaccine, the updated guidance makes sense (and indeed I predicted it upthread).
If you were living in Brazil right now, it would be an absolute no brainer to get this vaccine even if you're a 20 yr old.
god knows why anyone on here thinks I am German. I don't think any Germans come on here any more, far too toxic.
The EU have been a disaster for millions of its citizens and broken trust with international trade agreements that is going to cost them future investment
god knows why anyone on here thinks I am German. I don't think any Germans come on here any more, far too toxic.
The great thing about this place is we have intelligent people who can analyse what's going on dispassionately. Okay, I perhaps shouldn't have reacted, but you only came on here to score a point.
So to go all Sean T. Just fuck off.
don't worry I won't ever come back here, it is far too full of extremists for me. you don't even have any idea of how toxic this place has become - try inviting some non-British Europeans to read some of your raving discussions to see how it looks from a distance.
I'm not sure these graphs showing the risk during a 16 week period are very helpful. They give a wrongly inflated view of the risks from the vaccine.
Needs a politician to say "we can't stay locked down forever" so pay attention to those high exposure figures.
The 'low exposure risk' graph implied the risk from the vaccine was higher than the risk from covid, which is an absurd misrepresentation. We know covid isn't going to go away so they should assume that people will be exposed to covid at some point and base the risk/benefit profile on that.
Completely disagreed. It isn't misrepresented since Covid is going away, we won't all be exposed to Covid at some point - we'll be able to get an alternative vaccine at some point, or simply not be exposed to the virus ourselves. Yes the virus will still be there, but it won't get everyone, like HIV or other viruses.
This is the slide I'm talking about. It implies that the risk from the vaccination is greater than the risk from covid for 20-29 year olds, but it's based on them having a low risk of being exposed to it. This is disastrous messaging because it will encourage people not to get vaccinated at all.
Yes, trying to adjust the figures for likelihood of exposure is ridiculous.
They should just have stuck with the liklihood of death by covid or death by vaccine for the age range chart.
Nonsense. Likelihood of exposure is critical.
If I offered you a vaccine today that had a 1% chance of killing you, but protected you against rabies (100% chance of death if infected and untreated) would you take it?
Or would you think, I'm not likely to get rabies so no thanks.
As a comparison, I wonder what the risks are associated with ibuprofen or paracetamol? People are happy to take them even when entirely unnecessary, eg to treat the common cold.
Paracetomol is pretty safe, so long as you don't overdose. Ibuprofen, not so much (increases the risk of stomach bleeds significantly, for instance). I don't take it at all.
I'm not sure these graphs showing the risk during a 16 week period are very helpful. They give a wrongly inflated view of the risks from the vaccine.
Needs a politician to say "we can't stay locked down forever" so pay attention to those high exposure figures.
The 'low exposure risk' graph implied the risk from the vaccine was higher than the risk from covid, which is an absurd misrepresentation. We know covid isn't going to go away so they should assume that people will be exposed to covid at some point and base the risk/benefit profile on that.
Completely disagreed. It isn't misrepresented since Covid is going away, we won't all be exposed to Covid at some point - we'll be able to get an alternative vaccine at some point, or simply not be exposed to the virus ourselves. Yes the virus will still be there, but it won't get everyone, like HIV or other viruses.
This is the slide I'm talking about. It implies that the risk from the vaccination is greater than the risk from covid for 20-29 year olds, but it's based on them having a low risk of being exposed to it. This is disastrous messaging because it will encourage people not to get vaccinated at all.
Hang on, the "every 16 weeks" disclaimer means they aren't exactly comparing like with like...
It is going to be a 'low exposure risk' for a lot longer than that, surely.
No because everyone ought to be able to get access to an alternative vaccine within 16 weeks.
Ah, true, assuming this doesn't put people off completely. Does that mean they are assuming a 16 week delay, then? I do hope not.
I also hope the alternative vaccine doesn't turn out to have the same issues. Then what?
No actually they're saying there won't be any delay.
Perhaps the 16 week delay would occur if we stopped AZ altogether? There must have been some rationale for using it.
god knows why anyone on here thinks I am German. I don't think any Germans come on here any more, far too toxic.
The great thing about this place is we have intelligent people who can analyse what's going on dispassionately. Okay, I perhaps shouldn't have reacted, but you only came on here to score a point.
So to go all Sean T. Just fuck off.
don't worry I won't ever come back here, it is far too full of extremists for me. you don't even have any idea of how toxic this place has become - try inviting some non-British Europeans to read some of your raving discussions to see how it looks from a distance.
god knows why anyone on here thinks I am German. I don't think any Germans come on here any more, far too toxic.
I tihnk most of us know you're not German (not that it matters either way). I value your posts and your perspective, on this as well as many other topics.
The thing is, that most of us didn't say there could not be a link to blood clots, but only that (a) there seemed to be a lack of evidence and (b) the benefits of vacination clearly outweighed the possible risks.
Now, with passing of more time and more analysis, (a) seems to have appeared, for a specific type of clot rather than clots in general. However, (b) is still true, for the vast majority of the population here and for everyone in the many countries in Europe that presently have higher infection rates.
Even with hindsight, pausing AZN a few weeks back does not look to have been a net benefit, particularly given the vaccinations were mainly (prevented from) going to older people in countries with higher infection rates
"She says that up to 31 March, 20m doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine were given and 79 cases of rare blood clots were reported.
All 79 cases occured after the first dose and 19 people sadly died, Raine says.
Of the cases, 51 were women and 28 men aged 18 to 79 years old.
She said the risk of this kind of side effect was about four in one million to those who receive the vaccine."
19 out of 20m I make just under 1 in a million deaths or roughly 5 deaths in Scotland where there are currently 7,614 registered Covid deaths.
When did we earn the right to live in a world without risk? The world has genuinely gone potty. Do people have no concept of risk assessment? I am going for my jab on Monday. If its AZ that will be absolutely fine. Of course if I do turn out to be one of the 5 I will be disappointed.
Yes, it's batshit once you factor in the extra downside of booming anti-vaxxery, it makes no sense on a risk-benefit analysis. I've taken multiple medicines that must have had a 1 in 100,000 risk of death or higher
So, either they know something and they're not telling us, OR they have gone mad.
Ergo, this decision is so silly it is tempting me into mad anti-vax beliefs (I shall resist, but you see the point)
Twats
Or you can't do maths or science.
If a vaccine at low prevalence gives you a 1/100,000 risk of death - and being unvaccinated gives you a 1% higher of getting infected and a 1/2,500 chance of dying if you are, then should you be vaccinated?
williamglenn is right. The presumption of low exposure in the UK is crap, as well. What if Covid comes back, then we are all high exposure again. And suddenly not giving AZ to the yoof is idiotic, even by the maths
This is a pile of pants decision made by a scientific cabal which is crapping itself about some future inquiry and doesn't understand how most people think. Or, to use the parlance, they are exercising an overabundance of caution
Sigh
Almost no-one (statistically) in the 29-18 group is getting jabbed at the moment. The numbers that are, can easily be handled with another vaccine.
By the time we get to 29- groups, we will have, almost certainly, large quantities of other vaccines.
BTW, back on an envelope, I think the UK needs to put another 60M jabs in arms to get to 90% of the adult population having had both doses.
Do we know which vaccines are intended to make up that 60M? Presumably we are close to using up all our Pfizer order.
Around 26m of our 40m Pfizer doses are either jabbed or spoken for, we've got 17m Moderna and 60m Novavax coming. Under 50s will predominantly be getting the remainder of the Pfizer doses, Moderna or Novavax.
Novavax looks like the real MVP for us right now and Moderna a good bridging vaccine until we get volume deliveries of it.
We're currently going through ~2.5m doses per week though aren't we? More last month.
How many Novavax per week should we be getting?
Around 0.8m per week to start with and a ramp up to 3.6m per week by the middle of summer.
Between Moderna, Pfizer and Novavax we should get around 1.5m doses per week, *just for first doses* in May and about 2m per week in June. In addition we've got the AZ deliveries and Pfizer stockpile for second doses. As I've been saying for a while, I'm not really sure why people are panicking so much.
I think the government may reserve 30m of our Novavax order for a variant fighting reformulation.
Why would those under 30 or even 40 bother with vaccine. AZ is a risk. But the mRNA vaccines have questions over long-term safety. I can envisage a low vaccine uptake among the under 40s. That seems to be the feedback from my children. They would rather get immunity from a mild infection rather than risk an innocculation.
I'm not sure these graphs showing the risk during a 16 week period are very helpful. They give a wrongly inflated view of the risks from the vaccine.
Needs a politician to say "we can't stay locked down forever" so pay attention to those high exposure figures.
The 'low exposure risk' graph implied the risk from the vaccine was higher than the risk from covid, which is an absurd misrepresentation. We know covid isn't going to go away so they should assume that people will be exposed to covid at some point and base the risk/benefit profile on that.
Completely disagreed. It isn't misrepresented since Covid is going away, we won't all be exposed to Covid at some point - we'll be able to get an alternative vaccine at some point, or simply not be exposed to the virus ourselves. Yes the virus will still be there, but it won't get everyone, like HIV or other viruses.
This is the slide I'm talking about. It implies that the risk from the vaccination is greater than the risk from covid for 20-29 year olds, but it's based on them having a low risk of being exposed to it. This is disastrous messaging because it will encourage people not to get vaccinated at all.
Yes, trying to adjust the figures for likelihood of exposure is ridiculous.
They should just have stuck with the liklihood of death by covid or death by vaccine for the age range chart.
That chart is misguided on multiple levels. Calamitous PR
It's a bit like saying there is a low risk of death using a pogostick on a motorway because there isn't much traffic at the moment
As a comparison, I wonder what the risks are associated with ibuprofen or paracetamol? People are happy to take them even when entirely unnecessary, eg to treat the common cold.
Paracetomol is pretty safe, so long as you don't overdose. Ibuprofen, not so much (increases the risk of stomach bleeds significantly, for instance). I don't take it at all.
Why would those under 30 or even 40 bother with vaccine. AZ is a risk. But the mRNA vaccines have questions over long-term safety. I can envisage a low vaccine uptake among the under 40s. That seems to be the feedback from my children. They would rather get immunity from a mild infection rather than risk an innocculation.
Why would those under 30 or even 40 bother with vaccine. AZ is a risk. But the mRNA vaccines have questions over long-term safety. I can envisage a low vaccine uptake among the under 40s. That seems to be the feedback from my children. They would rather get immunity from a mild infection rather than risk an innocculation.
A low risk for them, but not for young people with other illnesses and older people who they might pass the infection on to, and remember the vacine isn't perfect.
That confirms it, only under 30s in group 2 are going to see an immediate change. Groups 4 and 6 will still get AZ as the risk differential is probably very much in favour of using it.
Honestly, this could easily, easily have just been done very quietly with a midnight press release and loads of technical jargon.
Doesn't surprise me to see you sharing such stupidity.
The risk profile for under 30s is wildly different to the risk profile for others.
Well JVTs slide said in 30-40s with low exposure risk
Risk of serious harm AZ is 0.8 per 100k
Covid risk of ICU admission is 2.7 per 100k
... per 16 weeks at very low prevalence. When we open up properly, unless we've hit herd immunity thanks to enough people taking the vaccine, we won't be at very low prevalence. The entire point of the vaccine programme is to reduce covid risk by two strands:
1 - Possibly squashing prevalence down towards zero covid by bazooka-ing the R rate 2 - Making it so that a high prevalence (if #1 doesn't occur) is no longer associated with a high risk of injury or death.
We had a prevalence 30 times the current one at the peak.
Did anyone say why AZ is causing problems or do they still have no idea?
There's a distinct lack of actual analysis here isn't there? Of those who apparently had blood clot events associated with the vaccine (I'm assuming other causes have been ruled out) there is a vast preponderance of women. I am also anecdotally aware that the side effects have been harsher on women - could this be a dosing issue? Should women and men, who are differently sized, be receiving the same dose? Should it be given at lower levels based on size? Are the men who got blood clots smaller too? Indeed could such a policy be helpful in that it makes the available vaccine go further?
That confirms it, only under 30s in group 2 are going to see an immediate change. Groups 4 and 6 will still get AZ as the risk differential is probably very much in favour of using it.
Honestly, this could easily, easily have just been done very quietly with a midnight press release and loads of technical jargon.
The trouble is that after a year of treating everyone like 5 year olds with patronising slogans and saying that EVERYONE was at risk of covid , they expect the public to note the nuance in advising AZ is not taken by under 30s but ok for everyone else. Dicks
god knows why anyone on here thinks I am German. I don't think any Germans come on here any more, far too toxic.
I tihnk most of us know you're not German (not that it matters either way). I value your posts and your perspective, on this as well as many other topics.
The thing is, that most of us didn't say there could not be a link to blood clots, but only that (a) there seemed to be a lack of evidence and (b) the benefits of vacination clearly outweighed the possible risks.
Now, with passing of more time and more analysis, (a) seems to have appeared, for a specific type of clot rather than clots in general. However, (b) is still true, for the vast majority of the population here and for everyone in the many countries in Europe that presently have higher infection rates.
Even with hindsight, pausing AZN a few weeks back does not look to have been a net benefit, particularly given the vaccinations were mainly (prevented from) going to older people in countries with higher infection rates
I heard on the radio a German doctor who was the head of some intensive care body explicitly say that the pause would cause hundreds of deaths per week by his estimate. So in all likelihood no net lives will ever be saved in Europe from any action taken related to the AZ vaccine, as already more will have died than can ever be saved by avoiding clots.
I see this as an ethical issue: everyone injected should have better than evens chance of having their life saved by it compared with being killed by it. That there is very chance of either happening in young healthy adults doesn't remove the equation.
The reason for vaccinating young people is to stop community spread. But that isn't enough on its own. Each person inoculated needs to have an individual potential benefit - we can't ask them to take one for the community.
AIUI.
Yet the EMA has NOT made this recommendation
??
Because the risks change according to the prevalence of COVID.
If you are uptown your ears in COVID cases, then there is far less risk taking AZN than risking COVID
If there is no COVID, then the risk of taking AZN predominates.
There is so much vaccine nationalism nonsense on here, but if you recall from episode 14 of this interminable boxset, the whole thing was kicked off due to expected quantities of Astrazeneca not turning up at the portals of Berlaymont. Which makes it rather easier for EU parties to find alternatives to a medicine they don't actually have in quantity. In fact that very accusation was made against them (probably episode 83): they were deliberately trashing a vaccine they didn't have in quantity, while at the same time killing their populations by withholding it.
So it is quite the plot twist that the MHRA is putting conditions on AZ, while the EMA doesn't.
Personally I would go more for intelligent and conscientious scientists at each institution coming to informed but different conclusions based on the evidence and their understanding of the situation. And that is as it needs to be. They make the calls.
Doesn't surprise me to see you sharing such stupidity.
The risk profile for under 30s is wildly different to the risk profile for others.
Well JVTs slide said in 30-40s with low exposure risk
Risk of serious harm AZ is 0.8 per 100k
Covid risk of ICU admission is 2.7 per 100k
... per 16 weeks at very low prevalence. When we open up properly, unless we've hit herd immunity thanks to enough people taking the vaccine, we won't be at very low prevalence. The entire point of the vaccine programme is to reduce covid risk by two strands:
1 - Possibly squashing prevalence down towards zero covid by bazooka-ing the R rate 2 - Making it so that a high prevalence (if #1 doesn't occur) is no longer associated with a high risk of injury or death.
We had a prevalence 30 times the current one at the peak.
You keep claiming prevalence will go up and extrapolating from that but reality from Israel is the polar opposite. Prevalence is still cratering as the vaccine has slashed R.
That confirms it, only under 30s in group 2 are going to see an immediate change. Groups 4 and 6 will still get AZ as the risk differential is probably very much in favour of using it.
Honestly, this could easily, easily have just been done very quietly with a midnight press release and loads of technical jargon.
The idea that posting information in the disused lavatory marked "Beware of the Leopard" achieves anything other than the Streisand Effect........
In the modern world, the sensible thing to do is to get out in front, and provide answers to the whole story. Before the Twatter types have time to invent their bullshit.
That confirms it, only under 30s in group 2 are going to see an immediate change. Groups 4 and 6 will still get AZ as the risk differential is probably very much in favour of using it.
Honestly, this could easily, easily have just been done very quietly with a midnight press release and loads of technical jargon.
Perhaps they thought they had to have one at the same time as the EMA to make sure their message got out rather than someone else's?
It just turned out that the EMA's conference didn't say what they expected.
Why would those under 30 or even 40 bother with vaccine. AZ is a risk. But the mRNA vaccines have questions over long-term safety. I can envisage a low vaccine uptake among the under 40s. That seems to be the feedback from my children. They would rather get immunity from a mild infection rather than risk an innocculation.
Absolubtely fucking bonkers
They've just been told, as a young person, that they can die OF A BLOODCLOT if they take AZ. They've also been told, for months, that nearly all young people only get "mild Covid" if they get infected at all.
That is the average person's reading of this. Most people aren't great at maths and most people don't obsessively pore over immunological papers and Com Res opinion polls in West Cornwall
The message that screams out from this press conference is, therefore, if you're under 30 (or even under 40, or 50) don't take AZ, it's not worth it, and be more suspicious of vaccines in general
I really really really hope I am wrong, and that the great British public exercise advanced common sense. We shall see
Why would those under 30 or even 40 bother with vaccine. AZ is a risk. But the mRNA vaccines have questions over long-term safety. I can envisage a low vaccine uptake among the under 40s. That seems to be the feedback from my children. They would rather get immunity from a mild infection rather than risk an innocculation.
Kicking the bucket from Covid is a very low risk for the under 40s. Long Covid isn't. And it's bloody nasty.
Young people not taking the vaccines are doing two things: they're still taking an unnecessary gamble with their health and well being, and they're also increasing the likelihood of the Government keeping more miserable restrictions in place for longer, under the pretext of rising cases amongst the unprotected.
I mean, I worry that there's a substantial lobby amongst ministers and their advisers that wants to keep as many rules in place for as long as possible regardless, but at least let's try to give them as few excuses as possible for doing so.
That confirms it, only under 30s in group 2 are going to see an immediate change. Groups 4 and 6 will still get AZ as the risk differential is probably very much in favour of using it.
Honestly, this could easily, easily have just been done very quietly with a midnight press release and loads of technical jargon.
Perhaps they thought they had to have one at the same time as the EMA to make sure their message got out rather than someone else's?
It just turned out that the EMA's conference didn't say what they expected.
Prevalence in Europe is wildly different to the UK.
Why would those under 30 or even 40 bother with vaccine. AZ is a risk. But the mRNA vaccines have questions over long-term safety. I can envisage a low vaccine uptake among the under 40s. That seems to be the feedback from my children. They would rather get immunity from a mild infection rather than risk an innocculation.
A low risk for them, but not for young people with other illnesses and older people who they might pass the infection on to, and remember the vacine isn't perfect.
It's not low risk at all, if you do get Covid in your 20s the risks are miles higher than any of the vaccinations. The caution on AZ vaccine is because the risk of catching Covid due to 30+ million vaccinated people + restrictions means you've got a lowish chance of catching it in the first place AND crucially you can simply replace with another vaccine. The risk of being unvaccinated in the general population once we're reopened is miles higher.
I'm not sure these graphs showing the risk during a 16 week period are very helpful. They give a wrongly inflated view of the risks from the vaccine.
Needs a politician to say "we can't stay locked down forever" so pay attention to those high exposure figures.
The 'low exposure risk' graph implied the risk from the vaccine was higher than the risk from covid, which is an absurd misrepresentation. We know covid isn't going to go away so they should assume that people will be exposed to covid at some point and base the risk/benefit profile on that.
Completely disagreed. It isn't misrepresented since Covid is going away, we won't all be exposed to Covid at some point - we'll be able to get an alternative vaccine at some point, or simply not be exposed to the virus ourselves. Yes the virus will still be there, but it won't get everyone, like HIV or other viruses.
This is the slide I'm talking about. It implies that the risk from the vaccination is greater than the risk from covid for 20-29 year olds, but it's based on them having a low risk of being exposed to it. This is disastrous messaging because it will encourage people not to get vaccinated at all.
Yes, trying to adjust the figures for likelihood of exposure is ridiculous.
They should just have stuck with the liklihood of death by covid or death by vaccine for the age range chart.
That chart is misguided on multiple levels. Calamitous PR
It's a bit like saying there is a low risk of death using a pogostick on a motorway because there isn't much traffic at the moment
Why would those under 30 or even 40 bother with vaccine. AZ is a risk. But the mRNA vaccines have questions over long-term safety. I can envisage a low vaccine uptake among the under 40s. That seems to be the feedback from my children. They would rather get immunity from a mild infection rather than risk an innocculation.
Absolubtely fucking bonkers
They've just been told, as a young person, that they can die OF A BLOODCLOT if they take AZ. They've also been told, for months, that nearly all young people only get "mild Covid" if they get infected at all.
That is the average person's reading of this. Most people aren't great at maths and most people don't obsessively pore over immunological papers and Com Res opinion polls in West Cornwall
The message that screams out from this press conference is, therefore, if you're under 30 (or even under 40, or 50) don't take AZ, it's not worth it, and be more suspicious of vaccines in general
I really really really hope I am wrong, and that the great British public exercise advanced common sense. We shall see
The average person will barely notice this. They will keep calm and carry on.
Did anyone say why AZ is causing problems or do they still have no idea?
There's a distinct lack of actual analysis here isn't there? Of those who apparently had blood clot events associated with the vaccine (I'm assuming other causes have been ruled out) there is a vast preponderance of women. I am also anecdotally aware that the side effects have been harsher on women - could this be a dosing issue? Should women and men, who are differently sized, be receiving the same dose? Should it be given at lower levels based on size? Are the men who got blood clots smaller too? Indeed could such a policy be helpful in that it makes the available vaccine go further?
Actually they said the opposite, IIRC. When asked about gender, Van Tam (or whoever) said that that more women had these very rare side effects, but more young women had gotten the jab, so it was probably even (this makes sense, as so many jabbed young care workers are women)
Why would those under 30 or even 40 bother with vaccine. AZ is a risk. But the mRNA vaccines have questions over long-term safety. I can envisage a low vaccine uptake among the under 40s. That seems to be the feedback from my children. They would rather get immunity from a mild infection rather than risk an innocculation.
Because the number "1" is considerably lower than the number "1000", and that's about the ratio of risk between injection and infection in the young. If the risk from covid is low then how can AZ be "a risk"? And what specific questions are there about long-term safety for mRNA vaccines?
Can't be worse than seeing Kay Burley back on our screens. Be interesting to see if they can ask any sensible questions, Brillo was always good at that himself.
Why would those under 30 or even 40 bother with vaccine. AZ is a risk. But the mRNA vaccines have questions over long-term safety. I can envisage a low vaccine uptake among the under 40s. That seems to be the feedback from my children. They would rather get immunity from a mild infection rather than risk an innocculation.
Absolubtely fucking bonkers
They've just been told, as a young person, that they can die OF A BLOODCLOT if they take AZ. They've also been told, for months, that nearly all young people only get "mild Covid" if they get infected at all.
That is the average person's reading of this. Most people aren't great at maths and most people don't obsessively pore over immunological papers and Com Res opinion polls in West Cornwall
The message that screams out from this press conference is, therefore, if you're under 30 (or even under 40, or 50) don't take AZ, it's not worth it, and be more suspicious of vaccines in general
I really really really hope I am wrong, and that the great British public exercise advanced common sense. We shall see
If you leave your house or flat you can be run over by a bus too. In principle, if you're really slow to react you might get run over by a steam-roller too. (When I say 'too' I don't mean that it'd follow on. I think that' really very unlikely)
That confirms it, only under 30s in group 2 are going to see an immediate change. Groups 4 and 6 will still get AZ as the risk differential is probably very much in favour of using it.
Honestly, this could easily, easily have just been done very quietly with a midnight press release and loads of technical jargon.
The trouble is that after a year of treating everyone like 5 year olds with patronising slogans and saying that EVERYONE was at risk of covid , they expect the public to note the nuance in advising AZ is not taken by under 30s but ok for everyone else. Dicks
This is the key point.
The public health people want to have it both ways.
The risks from Covid (and, yes, Long Covid) are absolutely tiny for the healthy under-30s, statistically. Yet for a year, the public health people have been deliberately playing this down for rational public health reasons – they don't want millions of very mobile asymptomatic vectors out there.
Trouble is, they have now just let the cat out of the bag somewhat, with this bloody chart.
Many under-30s will now think, erm, "as they have now confirmed that may risks from the actually disease are so low as to be EVEN LOWER than the effing TINY risks from this vaccine, why would I then have any vaccine at all? What's the point?"
Doesn't surprise me to see you sharing such stupidity.
The risk profile for under 30s is wildly different to the risk profile for others.
Well JVTs slide said in 30-40s with low exposure risk
Risk of serious harm AZ is 0.8 per 100k
Covid risk of ICU admission is 2.7 per 100k
... per 16 weeks at very low prevalence. When we open up properly, unless we've hit herd immunity thanks to enough people taking the vaccine, we won't be at very low prevalence. The entire point of the vaccine programme is to reduce covid risk by two strands:
1 - Possibly squashing prevalence down towards zero covid by bazooka-ing the R rate 2 - Making it so that a high prevalence (if #1 doesn't occur) is no longer associated with a high risk of injury or death.
We had a prevalence 30 times the current one at the peak.
You keep claiming prevalence will go up and extrapolating from that but reality from Israel is the polar opposite. Prevalence is still cratering as the vaccine has slashed R.
Thus the "1 - Possibly squashing prevalence down towards zero covid by bazooka-ing the R rate" above. I'm very much hoping that prevalence craters (is bazooka-ed) as per what you've just quoted, but we don't know that for sure yet. Me saying prevalence would go up if we dropped all restrictions when only five million (8%) are double-dosed is not comparing us with Israel. Should the full dropping of restrictions cause R to get above 1, then prevalence will rise, but it should be irrelevant as people will be strongly protected from hospitalisation or death.
I'm not sure these graphs showing the risk during a 16 week period are very helpful. They give a wrongly inflated view of the risks from the vaccine.
Needs a politician to say "we can't stay locked down forever" so pay attention to those high exposure figures.
The 'low exposure risk' graph implied the risk from the vaccine was higher than the risk from covid, which is an absurd misrepresentation. We know covid isn't going to go away so they should assume that people will be exposed to covid at some point and base the risk/benefit profile on that.
Completely disagreed. It isn't misrepresented since Covid is going away, we won't all be exposed to Covid at some point - we'll be able to get an alternative vaccine at some point, or simply not be exposed to the virus ourselves. Yes the virus will still be there, but it won't get everyone, like HIV or other viruses.
This is the slide I'm talking about. It implies that the risk from the vaccination is greater than the risk from covid for 20-29 year olds, but it's based on them having a low risk of being exposed to it. This is disastrous messaging because it will encourage people not to get vaccinated at all.
Yes, trying to adjust the figures for likelihood of exposure is ridiculous.
They should just have stuck with the liklihood of death by covid or death by vaccine for the age range chart.
Nonsense. Likelihood of exposure is critical.
If I offered you a vaccine today that had a 1% chance of killing you, but protected you against rabies (100% chance of death if infected and untreated) would you take it?
Or would you think, I'm not likely to get rabies so no thanks.
Once things open up again everyone will be exposed to Covid in fairly short order . It's now endemic and is going to circulate like the common cold. Either they will have the vaccine to help them fight it off or they won't. It's nothing like rabies.
I'm not sure these graphs showing the risk during a 16 week period are very helpful. They give a wrongly inflated view of the risks from the vaccine.
Needs a politician to say "we can't stay locked down forever" so pay attention to those high exposure figures.
The 'low exposure risk' graph implied the risk from the vaccine was higher than the risk from covid, which is an absurd misrepresentation. We know covid isn't going to go away so they should assume that people will be exposed to covid at some point and base the risk/benefit profile on that.
Completely disagreed. It isn't misrepresented since Covid is going away, we won't all be exposed to Covid at some point - we'll be able to get an alternative vaccine at some point, or simply not be exposed to the virus ourselves. Yes the virus will still be there, but it won't get everyone, like HIV or other viruses.
This is the slide I'm talking about. It implies that the risk from the vaccination is greater than the risk from covid for 20-29 year olds, but it's based on them having a low risk of being exposed to it. This is disastrous messaging because it will encourage people not to get vaccinated at all.
Yes, trying to adjust the figures for likelihood of exposure is ridiculous.
They should just have stuck with the liklihood of death by covid or death by vaccine for the age range chart.
That chart is misguided on multiple levels. Calamitous PR
It's a bit like saying there is a low risk of death using a pogostick on a motorway because there isn't much traffic at the moment
So speaks one of PB's levelest heads...
Thankyou, it's not often my equanimity and sang-froid is acknowledged on this site, but I do take quiet pride in my ability to stay ruthlessly calm when the rest of you chuck a mental
Did anyone say why AZ is causing problems or do they still have no idea?
There's a distinct lack of actual analysis here isn't there? Of those who apparently had blood clot events associated with the vaccine (I'm assuming other causes have been ruled out) there is a vast preponderance of women...
On the figures presented today, there isn't a statistically significant difference. The slightly larger numbers for women could quite easily be because, as healthcare workers, more young women than men have had the vaccine.
That confirms it, only under 30s in group 2 are going to see an immediate change. Groups 4 and 6 will still get AZ as the risk differential is probably very much in favour of using it.
Honestly, this could easily, easily have just been done very quietly with a midnight press release and loads of technical jargon.
Perhaps they thought they had to have one at the same time as the EMA to make sure their message got out rather than someone else's?
It just turned out that the EMA's conference didn't say what they expected.
Prevalence in Europe is wildly different to the UK.
Yes, understood, but that doesn't appear to have bothered the regulators in EU countries previously. The EMA has mostly remained calm, admittedly.
Why would those under 30 or even 40 bother with vaccine. AZ is a risk. But the mRNA vaccines have questions over long-term safety. I can envisage a low vaccine uptake among the under 40s. That seems to be the feedback from my children. They would rather get immunity from a mild infection rather than risk an innocculation.
A low risk for them, but not for young people with other illnesses and older people who they might pass the infection on to, and remember the vacine isn't perfect.
It's not low risk at all, if you do get Covid in your 20s the risks are miles higher than any of the vaccinations. The caution on AZ vaccine is because the risk of catching Covid due to 30+ million vaccinated people + restrictions means you've got a lowish chance of catching it in the first place AND crucially you can simply replace with another vaccine. The risk of being unvaccinated in the general population once we're reopened is miles higher.
I doubt we know the full risks of AZ , two days ago it was thought 100% safe (in the UK at least ) now its thought 99.999% safe , next week will more data mean its only 99% safe ? How are people who insist it is taken when offered so sure? Why do they trust the government so much? It is made up of largely muppets . AZ has already proven to be unsafe to some , with more data it could prove more unsafe.
I'm not sure these graphs showing the risk during a 16 week period are very helpful. They give a wrongly inflated view of the risks from the vaccine.
Needs a politician to say "we can't stay locked down forever" so pay attention to those high exposure figures.
The 'low exposure risk' graph implied the risk from the vaccine was higher than the risk from covid, which is an absurd misrepresentation. We know covid isn't going to go away so they should assume that people will be exposed to covid at some point and base the risk/benefit profile on that.
Completely disagreed. It isn't misrepresented since Covid is going away, we won't all be exposed to Covid at some point - we'll be able to get an alternative vaccine at some point, or simply not be exposed to the virus ourselves. Yes the virus will still be there, but it won't get everyone, like HIV or other viruses.
This is the slide I'm talking about. It implies that the risk from the vaccination is greater than the risk from covid for 20-29 year olds, but it's based on them having a low risk of being exposed to it. This is disastrous messaging because it will encourage people not to get vaccinated at all.
Yes, trying to adjust the figures for likelihood of exposure is ridiculous.
They should just have stuck with the liklihood of death by covid or death by vaccine for the age range chart.
Nonsense. Likelihood of exposure is critical.
If I offered you a vaccine today that had a 1% chance of killing you, but protected you against rabies (100% chance of death if infected and untreated) would you take it?
Or would you think, I'm not likely to get rabies so no thanks.
Once things open up again everyone will be exposed to Covid in fairly short order . It's now endemic and is going to circulate like the common cold. Either they will have the vaccine to help them fight it off or they won't. It's nothing like rabies.
No everyone won't be exposed in fairly short order. In Israel post lockdown R remains below 1 meaning prevalence is low and falling, not rising.
Okay PB brains trust, in light of today’s news, I’d like to ask a question. I’m 40, female, have an autoimmune disease (though mild enough not to be in a priority group) and have already had coronavirus. What is my approximate balance of risk of taking an AZ jab vs future COVID?
I’ve never hesitated taking a vaccination, I fully intend to still get vaccinated and FWIW I detest anti-vaxxers in general. But the risk/benefit ratio for my particular circumstances appears more finely balanced than before. Thoughts?
The MHRA were tremendously upfront in that press conference.
Of course honesty is the best policy. Covering things up or handwaving over side effects is not going to re-assure anyone.
And ridiculous to suggest anything else. Once a regulator starts down that road, they risk losing all credibility.
Why do we have fewer antivaxxers here than in many other countries? Impossible to be sure, but trust in the regulators (that they're both competent and honest) is likely a part of it.
Why would those under 30 or even 40 bother with vaccine. AZ is a risk. But the mRNA vaccines have questions over long-term safety. I can envisage a low vaccine uptake among the under 40s. That seems to be the feedback from my children. They would rather get immunity from a mild infection rather than risk an innocculation.
A low risk for them, but not for young people with other illnesses and older people who they might pass the infection on to, and remember the vacine isn't perfect.
It's not low risk at all, if you do get Covid in your 20s the risks are miles higher than any of the vaccinations. The caution on AZ vaccine is because the risk of catching Covid due to 30+ million vaccinated people + restrictions means you've got a lowish chance of catching it in the first place AND crucially you can simply replace with another vaccine. The risk of being unvaccinated in the general population once we're reopened is miles higher.
I doubt we know the full risks of AZ , two days ago it was thought 100% safe (in the UK at least ) now its thought 99.999% safe , next week will more data mean its only 99% safe ? How are people who insist it is taken when offered so sure? Why do they trust the government so much? It is made up of largely muppets . AZ has already proven to be unsafe to some , with more data it could prove more unsafe.
I have an anti-vaxxer friend in her 20s who was slowly coming round to the idea of accepting the jab, as it appeared to be safe after all.
Now?
NO WAY. She will never take AZ, or any other vaccine, unless it is compulsory on pain of jailtime. She's been proven right. The government has been lying. The jabs are evil and dangerous.
If 1 million people react like her we have a new and vast pool of unvaxed people who can get very sick or die, menacing the NHS, again
I'm not sure these graphs showing the risk during a 16 week period are very helpful. They give a wrongly inflated view of the risks from the vaccine.
Needs a politician to say "we can't stay locked down forever" so pay attention to those high exposure figures.
The 'low exposure risk' graph implied the risk from the vaccine was higher than the risk from covid, which is an absurd misrepresentation. We know covid isn't going to go away so they should assume that people will be exposed to covid at some point and base the risk/benefit profile on that.
Completely disagreed. It isn't misrepresented since Covid is going away, we won't all be exposed to Covid at some point - we'll be able to get an alternative vaccine at some point, or simply not be exposed to the virus ourselves. Yes the virus will still be there, but it won't get everyone, like HIV or other viruses.
This is the slide I'm talking about. It implies that the risk from the vaccination is greater than the risk from covid for 20-29 year olds, but it's based on them having a low risk of being exposed to it. This is disastrous messaging because it will encourage people not to get vaccinated at all.
Yes, trying to adjust the figures for likelihood of exposure is ridiculous.
They should just have stuck with the liklihood of death by covid or death by vaccine for the age range chart.
That chart is misguided on multiple levels. Calamitous PR
It's a bit like saying there is a low risk of death using a pogostick on a motorway because there isn't much traffic at the moment
So speaks one of PB's levelest heads...
Thankyou, it's not often my equanimity and sang-froid is acknowledged on this site, but I do take quiet pride in my ability to stay ruthlessly calm when the rest of you chuck a mental
Let's admit it, you have had a bit of a wobbly today
That confirms it, only under 30s in group 2 are going to see an immediate change. Groups 4 and 6 will still get AZ as the risk differential is probably very much in favour of using it.
Honestly, this could easily, easily have just been done very quietly with a midnight press release and loads of technical jargon.
The idea that posting information in the disused lavatory marked "Beware of the Leopard" achieves anything other than the Streisand Effect........
In the modern world, the sensible thing to do is to get out in front, and provide answers to the whole story. Before the Twatter types have time to invent their bullshit.
Why would those under 30 or even 40 bother with vaccine. AZ is a risk. But the mRNA vaccines have questions over long-term safety. I can envisage a low vaccine uptake among the under 40s. That seems to be the feedback from my children. They would rather get immunity from a mild infection rather than risk an innocculation.
A low risk for them, but not for young people with other illnesses and older people who they might pass the infection on to, and remember the vacine isn't perfect.
It's not low risk at all, if you do get Covid in your 20s the risks are miles higher than any of the vaccinations. The caution on AZ vaccine is because the risk of catching Covid due to 30+ million vaccinated people + restrictions means you've got a lowish chance of catching it in the first place AND crucially you can simply replace with another vaccine. The risk of being unvaccinated in the general population once we're reopened is miles higher.
I doubt we know the full risks of AZ , two days ago it was thought 100% safe (in the UK at least ) now its thought 99.999% safe , next week will more data mean its only 99% safe ? How are people who insist it is taken when offered so sure? Why do they trust the government so much? It is made up of largely muppets . AZ has already proven to be unsafe to some , with more data it could prove more unsafe.
Pull yourself together
The full risks are basically none.
There might be some link to blood clots, but as they happen anyway with roughly the frequency that they're being observed then the only issue is that it may change blood clot behavior.
These very rare occurrences should be looked at, of course.
Okay PB brains trust, in light of today’s news, I’d like to ask a question. I’m 40, female, have an autoimmune disease (though mild enough not to be in a priority group) and have already had coronavirus. What is my approximate balance of risk of taking an AZ jab vs future COVID?
I’ve never hesitated taking a vaccination, I fully intend to still get vaccinated and FWIW I detest anti-vaxxers in general. But the risk/benefit ratio for my particular circumstances appears more finely balanced than before. Thoughts?
That confirms it, only under 30s in group 2 are going to see an immediate change. Groups 4 and 6 will still get AZ as the risk differential is probably very much in favour of using it.
Honestly, this could easily, easily have just been done very quietly with a midnight press release and loads of technical jargon.
The trouble is that after a year of treating everyone like 5 year olds with patronising slogans and saying that EVERYONE was at risk of covid , they expect the public to note the nuance in advising AZ is not taken by under 30s but ok for everyone else. Dicks
This is the key point.
The public health people want to have it both ways.
The risks from Covid (and, yes, Long Covid) are absolutely tiny for the healthy under-30s, statistically. Yet for a year, the public health people have been deliberately playing this down for rational public health reasons – they don't want millions of very mobile asymptomatic vectors out there.
Trouble is, they have now just let the cat out of the bag somewhat, with this bloody chart.
Many under-30s will now think, erm, "as they have now confirmed that may risks from the actually disease are so low as to be EVEN LOWER than the effing TINY risks from this vaccine, why would I then have any vaccine at all? What's the point?"
Well they did say that under 30s will be offered vaccines that don't carry the risk factors so I'm not sure it's a big deal really. One specific vaccine that they won't be eligible for or probably won't want given the 12 week necessary gap has a vanishingly small issue. I'm not going to lose sleep over it and neither should anyone else. Tbh, everyone needs to take a step back and calm down a bit.
"She says that up to 31 March, 20m doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine were given and 79 cases of rare blood clots were reported.
All 79 cases occured after the first dose and 19 people sadly died, Raine says.
Of the cases, 51 were women and 28 men aged 18 to 79 years old.
She said the risk of this kind of side effect was about four in one million to those who receive the vaccine."
19 out of 20m I make just under 1 in a million deaths or roughly 5 deaths in Scotland where there are currently 7,614 registered Covid deaths.
When did we earn the right to live in a world without risk? The world has genuinely gone potty. Do people have no concept of risk assessment? I am going for my jab on Monday. If its AZ that will be absolutely fine. Of course if I do turn out to be one of the 5 I will be disappointed.
Yes, it's batshit once you factor in the extra downside of booming anti-vaxxery, it makes no sense on a risk-benefit analysis. I've taken multiple medicines that must have had a 1 in 100,000 risk of death or higher
So, either they know something and they're not telling us, OR they have gone mad.
Ergo, this decision is so silly it is tempting me into mad anti-vax beliefs (I shall resist, but you see the point)
Twats
Or you can't do maths or science.
If a vaccine at low prevalence gives you a 1/100,000 risk of death - and being unvaccinated gives you a 1% higher of getting infected and a 1/2,500 chance of dying if you are, then should you be vaccinated?
Unless we achieve herd immunity the chances of catching this virus if you are not immunised must tend towards 100% not 1%. We have 4.3m recorded cases already and probably more than that again that went unrecorded. If that is right then the direct comparators are 1 or 1.1 in 100k of a risk and 6.3 in 100k of dying. The risk of being seriously ill is of course much greater.
These charts skew that risk by measuring risk over relatively short periods of time. I really don't understand why they did that.
I'm not sure these graphs showing the risk during a 16 week period are very helpful. They give a wrongly inflated view of the risks from the vaccine.
Needs a politician to say "we can't stay locked down forever" so pay attention to those high exposure figures.
The 'low exposure risk' graph implied the risk from the vaccine was higher than the risk from covid, which is an absurd misrepresentation. We know covid isn't going to go away so they should assume that people will be exposed to covid at some point and base the risk/benefit profile on that.
Completely disagreed. It isn't misrepresented since Covid is going away, we won't all be exposed to Covid at some point - we'll be able to get an alternative vaccine at some point, or simply not be exposed to the virus ourselves. Yes the virus will still be there, but it won't get everyone, like HIV or other viruses.
This is the slide I'm talking about. It implies that the risk from the vaccination is greater than the risk from covid for 20-29 year olds, but it's based on them having a low risk of being exposed to it. This is disastrous messaging because it will encourage people not to get vaccinated at all.
Yes, trying to adjust the figures for likelihood of exposure is ridiculous.
They should just have stuck with the liklihood of death by covid or death by vaccine for the age range chart.
That chart is misguided on multiple levels. Calamitous PR
It's a bit like saying there is a low risk of death using a pogostick on a motorway because there isn't much traffic at the moment
So speaks one of PB's levelest heads...
Thankyou, it's not often my equanimity and sang-froid is acknowledged on this site, but I do take quiet pride in my ability to stay ruthlessly calm when the rest of you chuck a mental
Let's admit it, you have had a bit of a wobbly today
I really haven't. That was a poo-flinging disaster of a press conference, and I have merely pointed that out, in a floral way
I believe the MRHA has just jeopardised British lives, big time, and also the British economy, by potentially delaying the roadmap. It is not a moment for my normal discourse of quiet understatement
Now they're saying if you're 30 or 31 decide for yourself..... if you want the jab...
The messaging is all over the place. This is the problem. in the light of that incoherence, all that most people will take away is AZ CAN KILL YOU WITH A BLOODCLOT
It has always been a personal choice, hasn't it? There is no compulsion.
I fear you are over-reacting to this, just a touch. There was very little effect on take-up of all the shenanigans and fake news from the continent.
Over-reacting???????????????????? ME???????????
In all seriousness, this *feels* bad, to me. It feels like the day they announced the Kentish Variant
I do hope I am wrong and I will happily pour curry sauce over my testicles if I am
No need to go that far
If that's a curry sauce as found in the UK, you will hardly notice.
Unless you have applied one of those flint things first as a shaving tool.
I'm not sure these graphs showing the risk during a 16 week period are very helpful. They give a wrongly inflated view of the risks from the vaccine.
Needs a politician to say "we can't stay locked down forever" so pay attention to those high exposure figures.
The 'low exposure risk' graph implied the risk from the vaccine was higher than the risk from covid, which is an absurd misrepresentation. We know covid isn't going to go away so they should assume that people will be exposed to covid at some point and base the risk/benefit profile on that.
Completely disagreed. It isn't misrepresented since Covid is going away, we won't all be exposed to Covid at some point - we'll be able to get an alternative vaccine at some point, or simply not be exposed to the virus ourselves. Yes the virus will still be there, but it won't get everyone, like HIV or other viruses.
This is the slide I'm talking about. It implies that the risk from the vaccination is greater than the risk from covid for 20-29 year olds, but it's based on them having a low risk of being exposed to it. This is disastrous messaging because it will encourage people not to get vaccinated at all.
Yes, trying to adjust the figures for likelihood of exposure is ridiculous.
They should just have stuck with the liklihood of death by covid or death by vaccine for the age range chart.
That chart is misguided on multiple levels. Calamitous PR
It's a bit like saying there is a low risk of death using a pogostick on a motorway because there isn't much traffic at the moment
So speaks one of PB's levelest heads...
Thankyou, it's not often my equanimity and sang-froid is acknowledged on this site, but I do take quiet pride in my ability to stay ruthlessly calm when the rest of you chuck a mental
Let's admit it, you have had a bit of a wobbly today
I really haven't. That was a poo-flinging disaster of a press conference, and I have merely pointed that out, in a floral way
I believe the MRHA has just jeopardised British lives, big time, and also the British economy, by potentially delaying the roadmap. It is not a moment for my normal discourse of quiet understatement
In the end honesty is the only policy and I doubt it will see much of a negative change in our vaccination programme or timeline
Why would those under 30 or even 40 bother with vaccine. AZ is a risk. But the mRNA vaccines have questions over long-term safety. I can envisage a low vaccine uptake among the under 40s. That seems to be the feedback from my children. They would rather get immunity from a mild infection rather than risk an innocculation.
A low risk for them, but not for young people with other illnesses and older people who they might pass the infection on to, and remember the vacine isn't perfect.
It's not low risk at all, if you do get Covid in your 20s the risks are miles higher than any of the vaccinations. The caution on AZ vaccine is because the risk of catching Covid due to 30+ million vaccinated people + restrictions means you've got a lowish chance of catching it in the first place AND crucially you can simply replace with another vaccine. The risk of being unvaccinated in the general population once we're reopened is miles higher.
I doubt we know the full risks of AZ , two days ago it was thought 100% safe (in the UK at least ) now its thought 99.999% safe , next week will more data mean its only 99% safe ? How are people who insist it is taken when offered so sure? Why do they trust the government so much? It is made up of largely muppets . AZ has already proven to be unsafe to some , with more data it could prove more unsafe.
Pull yourself together
The full risks are basically none.
There might be some link to blood clots, but as they happen anyway with roughly the frequency that they're being observed then the only issue is that it may change blood clot behavior.
These very rare occurrences should be looked at, of course.
stop being such an arrogant dick - two days ago you thought it was perfectly safe no doubt- how do you not know (you dont of course) two days from now the data will show it is more dangerous than thought today. ?
Okay PB brains trust, in light of today’s news, I’d like to ask a question. I’m 40, female, have an autoimmune disease (though mild enough not to be in a priority group) and have already had coronavirus. What is my approximate balance of risk of taking an AZ jab vs future COVID?
I’ve never hesitated taking a vaccination, I fully intend to still get vaccinated and FWIW I detest anti-vaxxers in general. But the risk/benefit ratio for my particular circumstances appears more finely balanced than before. Thoughts?
Having had the virus, you are at low risk, though there is some suggestion that vaccination immunity is longer lasting than the virus itself. Some auto immune diseases predispose to clotting, and the CVST condition is more common in women. Nonetheless, the guidance is to have the vaccine if called, on balance of risk.
Doesn't surprise me to see you sharing such stupidity.
The risk profile for under 30s is wildly different to the risk profile for others.
Well JVTs slide said in 30-40s with low exposure risk
Risk of serious harm AZ is 0.8 per 100k
Covid risk of ICU admission is 2.7 per 100k
... per 16 weeks at very low prevalence. When we open up properly, unless we've hit herd immunity thanks to enough people taking the vaccine, we won't be at very low prevalence. The entire point of the vaccine programme is to reduce covid risk by two strands:
1 - Possibly squashing prevalence down towards zero covid by bazooka-ing the R rate 2 - Making it so that a high prevalence (if #1 doesn't occur) is no longer associated with a high risk of injury or death.
We had a prevalence 30 times the current one at the peak.
You keep claiming prevalence will go up and extrapolating from that but reality from Israel is the polar opposite. Prevalence is still cratering as the vaccine has slashed R.
Thus the "1 - Possibly squashing prevalence down towards zero covid by bazooka-ing the R rate" above. I'm very much hoping that prevalence craters (is bazooka-ed) as per what you've just quoted, but we don't know that for sure yet. Me saying prevalence would go up if we dropped all restrictions when only five million (8%) are double-dosed is not comparing us with Israel. Should the full dropping of restrictions cause R to get above 1, then prevalence will rise, but it should be irrelevant as people will be strongly protected from hospitalisation or death.
Israel lifted their restrictions at the start of February not today. We have more vaccinated now than they did then. Our prevalence is much lower than theirs then too.
The first dose provides the vast bulk of the protection not the second. No need to do a comedy Dave and compare second doses.
Did anyone say why AZ is causing problems or do they still have no idea?
There's a distinct lack of actual analysis here isn't there? Of those who apparently had blood clot events associated with the vaccine (I'm assuming other causes have been ruled out) there is a vast preponderance of women. I am also anecdotally aware that the side effects have been harsher on women - could this be a dosing issue? Should women and men, who are differently sized, be receiving the same dose? Should it be given at lower levels based on size? Are the men who got blood clots smaller too? Indeed could such a policy be helpful in that it makes the available vaccine go further?
Actually they said the opposite, IIRC. When asked about gender, Van Tam (or whoever) said that that more women had these very rare side effects, but more young women had gotten the jab, so it was probably even (this makes sense, as so many jabbed young care workers are women)
Yes - Sir Munir Pirmohamed said that when they controlled for vaccinated population they found the risk was broadly equal between men & women - it's only because more young women have had the jab, more of them have had bloodclots....
One observation - I wonder how many European countries would have had so many very senior scientists/doctors from ethnic minorities delivering such a press conference?
I'm not sure these graphs showing the risk during a 16 week period are very helpful. They give a wrongly inflated view of the risks from the vaccine.
Needs a politician to say "we can't stay locked down forever" so pay attention to those high exposure figures.
The 'low exposure risk' graph implied the risk from the vaccine was higher than the risk from covid, which is an absurd misrepresentation. We know covid isn't going to go away so they should assume that people will be exposed to covid at some point and base the risk/benefit profile on that.
Completely disagreed. It isn't misrepresented since Covid is going away, we won't all be exposed to Covid at some point - we'll be able to get an alternative vaccine at some point, or simply not be exposed to the virus ourselves. Yes the virus will still be there, but it won't get everyone, like HIV or other viruses.
This is the slide I'm talking about. It implies that the risk from the vaccination is greater than the risk from covid for 20-29 year olds, but it's based on them having a low risk of being exposed to it. This is disastrous messaging because it will encourage people not to get vaccinated at all.
Yes, trying to adjust the figures for likelihood of exposure is ridiculous.
They should just have stuck with the liklihood of death by covid or death by vaccine for the age range chart.
That chart is misguided on multiple levels. Calamitous PR
It's a bit like saying there is a low risk of death using a pogostick on a motorway because there isn't much traffic at the moment
So speaks one of PB's levelest heads...
Thankyou, it's not often my equanimity and sang-froid is acknowledged on this site, but I do take quiet pride in my ability to stay ruthlessly calm when the rest of you chuck a mental
Let's admit it, you have had a bit of a wobbly today
I really haven't. That was a poo-flinging disaster of a press conference, and I have merely pointed that out, in a floral way
I believe the MRHA has just jeopardised British lives, big time, and also the British economy, by potentially delaying the roadmap. It is not a moment for my normal discourse of quiet understatement
In the end honesty is the only policy and I doubt it will see much of a negative change in our vaccination programme or timeline
I never said they should LIE. Honesty is always best. But there are ways and means of being honest, and you can select which facts to emphasise while giving all of those facts.
And that fucking graph with low exposure was imbecilic
"She says that up to 31 March, 20m doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine were given and 79 cases of rare blood clots were reported.
All 79 cases occured after the first dose and 19 people sadly died, Raine says.
Of the cases, 51 were women and 28 men aged 18 to 79 years old.
She said the risk of this kind of side effect was about four in one million to those who receive the vaccine."
19 out of 20m I make just under 1 in a million deaths or roughly 5 deaths in Scotland where there are currently 7,614 registered Covid deaths.
When did we earn the right to live in a world without risk? The world has genuinely gone potty. Do people have no concept of risk assessment? I am going for my jab on Monday. If its AZ that will be absolutely fine. Of course if I do turn out to be one of the 5 I will be disappointed.
Yes, it's batshit once you factor in the extra downside of booming anti-vaxxery, it makes no sense on a risk-benefit analysis. I've taken multiple medicines that must have had a 1 in 100,000 risk of death or higher
So, either they know something and they're not telling us, OR they have gone mad.
Ergo, this decision is so silly it is tempting me into mad anti-vax beliefs (I shall resist, but you see the point)
Twats
Or you can't do maths or science.
If a vaccine at low prevalence gives you a 1/100,000 risk of death - and being unvaccinated gives you a 1% higher of getting infected and a 1/2,500 chance of dying if you are, then should you be vaccinated?
williamglenn is right. The presumption of low exposure in the UK is crap, as well. What if Covid comes back, then we are all high exposure again. And suddenly not giving AZ to the yoof is idiotic, even by the maths
This is a pile of pants decision made by a scientific cabal which is crapping itself about some future inquiry and doesn't understand how most people think. Or, to use the parlance, they are exercising an overabundance of caution
You're clearly wumming here. Do you never feel slightly guilty about vomitting things you know to be untrue?
That confirms it, only under 30s in group 2 are going to see an immediate change. Groups 4 and 6 will still get AZ as the risk differential is probably very much in favour of using it.
Honestly, this could easily, easily have just been done very quietly with a midnight press release and loads of technical jargon.
The trouble is that after a year of treating everyone like 5 year olds with patronising slogans and saying that EVERYONE was at risk of covid , they expect the public to note the nuance in advising AZ is not taken by under 30s but ok for everyone else. Dicks
This is the key point.
The public health people want to have it both ways.
The risks from Covid (and, yes, Long Covid) are absolutely tiny for the healthy under-30s, statistically. Yet for a year, the public health people have been deliberately playing this down for rational public health reasons – they don't want millions of very mobile asymptomatic vectors out there.
Trouble is, they have now just let the cat out of the bag somewhat, with this bloody chart.
Many under-30s will now think, erm, "as they have now confirmed that may risks from the actually disease are so low as to be EVEN LOWER than the effing TINY risks from this vaccine, why would I then have any vaccine at all? What's the point?"
The risks from long Covid are not absolutely tiny, you are very much mistaken if you believe that.
I agree with your point about mixed messaging but the problem actually is that decision-makers have either not wised up to long Covid fast enough (March to December last year) or have forgotten about it (December to now, if that press conference is anything to go by).
The public messaging could have been extremely simple. The risks of mortality for the old are high but low in the young. The risks for morbidity are high in both groups. Why this keeps getting forgotten or is not made clear, I am unsure of. Probably because it is harder to count morbidity than it is body bags.
Why would those under 30 or even 40 bother with vaccine. AZ is a risk. But the mRNA vaccines have questions over long-term safety. I can envisage a low vaccine uptake among the under 40s. That seems to be the feedback from my children. They would rather get immunity from a mild infection rather than risk an innocculation.
A low risk for them, but not for young people with other illnesses and older people who they might pass the infection on to, and remember the vacine isn't perfect.
It's not low risk at all, if you do get Covid in your 20s the risks are miles higher than any of the vaccinations. The caution on AZ vaccine is because the risk of catching Covid due to 30+ million vaccinated people + restrictions means you've got a lowish chance of catching it in the first place AND crucially you can simply replace with another vaccine. The risk of being unvaccinated in the general population once we're reopened is miles higher.
I doubt we know the full risks of AZ , two days ago it was thought 100% safe (in the UK at least ) now its thought 99.999% safe , next week will more data mean its only 99% safe ? How are people who insist it is taken when offered so sure? Why do they trust the government so much? It is made up of largely muppets . AZ has already proven to be unsafe to some , with more data it could prove more unsafe.
How much more data are you after? The more we get, the more we can find out more vanishingly rare events. We've done enough to find one-in-a-million events because we've done millions of jabs. We're not going to suddenly find one-in-a-hundred events now, are we? "Oops, we all missed hundreds of thousands of events while we were scrutinising so hard we could pick up one-in-a-million events"
If it was 99% safe and we've jabbed nearly 20 million, we'd expect 200,000 people to have rolled up at hospital by now (and that's assuming you just mean getting seriously ill; if you're suggesting it's fatal one time in a hundred, then we'd have had 200,000 extra deaths in the past couple of months on top of the covid ones. We'd have noticed)
I'm not sure these graphs showing the risk during a 16 week period are very helpful. They give a wrongly inflated view of the risks from the vaccine.
Needs a politician to say "we can't stay locked down forever" so pay attention to those high exposure figures.
The 'low exposure risk' graph implied the risk from the vaccine was higher than the risk from covid, which is an absurd misrepresentation. We know covid isn't going to go away so they should assume that people will be exposed to covid at some point and base the risk/benefit profile on that.
Completely disagreed. It isn't misrepresented since Covid is going away, we won't all be exposed to Covid at some point - we'll be able to get an alternative vaccine at some point, or simply not be exposed to the virus ourselves. Yes the virus will still be there, but it won't get everyone, like HIV or other viruses.
This is the slide I'm talking about. It implies that the risk from the vaccination is greater than the risk from covid for 20-29 year olds, but it's based on them having a low risk of being exposed to it. This is disastrous messaging because it will encourage people not to get vaccinated at all.
Yes, trying to adjust the figures for likelihood of exposure is ridiculous.
They should just have stuck with the liklihood of death by covid or death by vaccine for the age range chart.
Nonsense. Likelihood of exposure is critical.
If I offered you a vaccine today that had a 1% chance of killing you, but protected you against rabies (100% chance of death if infected and untreated) would you take it?
Or would you think, I'm not likely to get rabies so no thanks.
Once things open up again everyone will be exposed to Covid in fairly short order . It's now endemic and is going to circulate like the common cold. Either they will have the vaccine to help them fight it off or they won't. It's nothing like rabies.
No everyone won't be exposed in fairly short order. In Israel post lockdown R remains below 1 meaning prevalence is low and falling, not rising.
This is true. We could do with more analysis of this because as you say, there is an assumption that R will immediately rise above 1 when we unlock. Yet a peer nation has done exactly that, at a similar level of vaccination than the UK, yet there R is below 1.
Okay PB brains trust, in light of today’s news, I’d like to ask a question. I’m 40, female, have an autoimmune disease (though mild enough not to be in a priority group) and have already had coronavirus. What is my approximate balance of risk of taking an AZ jab vs future COVID?
I’ve never hesitated taking a vaccination, I fully intend to still get vaccinated and FWIW I detest anti-vaxxers in general. But the risk/benefit ratio for my particular circumstances appears more finely balanced than before. Thoughts?
I think if you have already had Covid then the risks/rewards are much more finely balanced since it still seems vanishingly unlikely that you will catch it again. There is also a female bias in the risk for some reason. I think you might be better advised not to take AZ in that situation but I would be looking for an alternative.
The risk is of course vanishingly small but in your circumstance so is the reward.
I'm not sure these graphs showing the risk during a 16 week period are very helpful. They give a wrongly inflated view of the risks from the vaccine.
Needs a politician to say "we can't stay locked down forever" so pay attention to those high exposure figures.
The 'low exposure risk' graph implied the risk from the vaccine was higher than the risk from covid, which is an absurd misrepresentation. We know covid isn't going to go away so they should assume that people will be exposed to covid at some point and base the risk/benefit profile on that.
Completely disagreed. It isn't misrepresented since Covid is going away, we won't all be exposed to Covid at some point - we'll be able to get an alternative vaccine at some point, or simply not be exposed to the virus ourselves. Yes the virus will still be there, but it won't get everyone, like HIV or other viruses.
This is the slide I'm talking about. It implies that the risk from the vaccination is greater than the risk from covid for 20-29 year olds, but it's based on them having a low risk of being exposed to it. This is disastrous messaging because it will encourage people not to get vaccinated at all.
Yes, trying to adjust the figures for likelihood of exposure is ridiculous.
They should just have stuck with the liklihood of death by covid or death by vaccine for the age range chart.
Nonsense. Likelihood of exposure is critical.
If I offered you a vaccine today that had a 1% chance of killing you, but protected you against rabies (100% chance of death if infected and untreated) would you take it?
Or would you think, I'm not likely to get rabies so no thanks.
Once things open up again everyone will be exposed to Covid in fairly short order . It's now endemic and is going to circulate like the common cold. Either they will have the vaccine to help them fight it off or they won't. It's nothing like rabies.
No they won't because the prevalence is lower, that's the crucial point. Why would a 30-year old, considering vaccination now, care about what the prevalence was in March 2020?
Why would those under 30 or even 40 bother with vaccine. AZ is a risk. But the mRNA vaccines have questions over long-term safety. I can envisage a low vaccine uptake among the under 40s. That seems to be the feedback from my children. They would rather get immunity from a mild infection rather than risk an innocculation.
A low risk for them, but not for young people with other illnesses and older people who they might pass the infection on to, and remember the vacine isn't perfect.
It's not low risk at all, if you do get Covid in your 20s the risks are miles higher than any of the vaccinations. The caution on AZ vaccine is because the risk of catching Covid due to 30+ million vaccinated people + restrictions means you've got a lowish chance of catching it in the first place AND crucially you can simply replace with another vaccine. The risk of being unvaccinated in the general population once we're reopened is miles higher.
I doubt we know the full risks of AZ , two days ago it was thought 100% safe (in the UK at least ) now its thought 99.999% safe , next week will more data mean its only 99% safe ? How are people who insist it is taken when offered so sure? Why do they trust the government so much? It is made up of largely muppets . AZ has already proven to be unsafe to some , with more data it could prove more unsafe.
A lengthy examination of the statistics gleaned from an enormous number of recipients has yielded enough of a signal to suggest a minuscule risk of a nasty but extremely rare side effect might be associated with this medicine.
On the other hand, Covid kills and it also causes complications, even in the young. There are also broader deleterious implications for all age groups, including young people, in leaving large numbers if unvaccinated adults wandering about the country. Beyond that, we are also being entreated to listen to the advice of panels of scientific experts who give a very good impression of knowing what they are doing. It is not, thank goodness, as if we are simply being invited to accept the word of ministers in this case. If we were I'd be a lot more worried.
Beyond this, the concern that this specific medicine could be less safe than we think it is and we might find out about more extremely rare effects later applies equally to all the other vaccines. They are all new. What we do know, however, is that (a) the rollout is being monitored very, very carefully to look out for any problems - and I think we can be reasonably confident that no widespread and disastrous side effects have occurred, or they would've been identified by now - and (b) there is a lot of evidence that the vaccines are highly effective against Covid-19 and are helping to crush it. And Covid-19 is vastly more dangerous to our health, our economy and our society than these vaccines. There is no good reason to refuse any of them, unless it is being done based on sound medical advice.
Why would those under 30 or even 40 bother with vaccine. AZ is a risk. But the mRNA vaccines have questions over long-term safety. I can envisage a low vaccine uptake among the under 40s. That seems to be the feedback from my children. They would rather get immunity from a mild infection rather than risk an innocculation.
A low risk for them, but not for young people with other illnesses and older people who they might pass the infection on to, and remember the vacine isn't perfect.
It's not low risk at all, if you do get Covid in your 20s the risks are miles higher than any of the vaccinations. The caution on AZ vaccine is because the risk of catching Covid due to 30+ million vaccinated people + restrictions means you've got a lowish chance of catching it in the first place AND crucially you can simply replace with another vaccine. The risk of being unvaccinated in the general population once we're reopened is miles higher.
I doubt we know the full risks of AZ , two days ago it was thought 100% safe (in the UK at least ) now its thought 99.999% safe , next week will more data mean its only 99% safe ? How are people who insist it is taken when offered so sure? Why do they trust the government so much? It is made up of largely muppets . AZ has already proven to be unsafe to some , with more data it could prove more unsafe.
Pull yourself together
The full risks are basically none.
There might be some link to blood clots, but as they happen anyway with roughly the frequency that they're being observed then the only issue is that it may change blood clot behavior.
These very rare occurrences should be looked at, of course.
stop being such an arrogant dick - two days ago you thought it was perfectly safe no doubt- how do you not know (you dont of course) two days from now the data will show it is more dangerous than thought today. ?
Sorry. You may have misinterpreted the comment. Undoubtedly you should look at the facts as you find them. What I was trying to say is just go with that - don't fear that the future may hold bad news.
Don't think anyone has posted this yet. Good news on numbers again. Everything is still moving in the right direction.
On vaccines, as a 43yo man who is patiently waiting for a vaccine so I can see my parents safely again, I will take any UK-approved vaccine that is offered to me right now. I fear I'm in for a month long wait, unfortunately.
Did anyone say why AZ is causing problems or do they still have no idea?
There's a distinct lack of actual analysis here isn't there? Of those who apparently had blood clot events associated with the vaccine (I'm assuming other causes have been ruled out) there is a vast preponderance of women. I am also anecdotally aware that the side effects have been harsher on women - could this be a dosing issue? Should women and men, who are differently sized, be receiving the same dose? Should it be given at lower levels based on size? Are the men who got blood clots smaller too? Indeed could such a policy be helpful in that it makes the available vaccine go further?
Actually they said the opposite, IIRC. When asked about gender, Van Tam (or whoever) said that that more women had these very rare side effects, but more young women had gotten the jab, so it was probably even (this makes sense, as so many jabbed young care workers are women)
Yes - Sir Munir Pirmohamed said that when they controlled for vaccinated population they found the risk was broadly equal between men & women - it's only because more young women have had the jab, more of them have had bloodclots....
One observation - I wonder how many European countries would have had so many very senior scientists/doctors from ethnic minorities delivering such a press conference?
I am fairly sure - given vax hesitancy in BAME groups - that it was a deliberate choice to have BAME doctors. A sensible move, too.
I just wish they were better communicators: white black or brown. It was so poorly done. It also looked amateurish, with wobbly cameras and graphics, and lots of mumbling and muttering.
The EMA looked much more impressive, just by saying almost nothing, boringly, on high and gleaming podiums. Tedious facts and very little opinion, good camerawork and Teutonic dullness. That is the way to go with this stuff
Why would those under 30 or even 40 bother with vaccine. AZ is a risk. But the mRNA vaccines have questions over long-term safety. I can envisage a low vaccine uptake among the under 40s. That seems to be the feedback from my children. They would rather get immunity from a mild infection rather than risk an innocculation.
A low risk for them, but not for young people with other illnesses and older people who they might pass the infection on to, and remember the vacine isn't perfect.
It's not low risk at all, if you do get Covid in your 20s the risks are miles higher than any of the vaccinations. The caution on AZ vaccine is because the risk of catching Covid due to 30+ million vaccinated people + restrictions means you've got a lowish chance of catching it in the first place AND crucially you can simply replace with another vaccine. The risk of being unvaccinated in the general population once we're reopened is miles higher.
I doubt we know the full risks of AZ , two days ago it was thought 100% safe (in the UK at least ) now its thought 99.999% safe , next week will more data mean its only 99% safe ? How are people who insist it is taken when offered so sure? Why do they trust the government so much? It is made up of largely muppets . AZ has already proven to be unsafe to some , with more data it could prove more unsafe.
I have an anti-vaxxer friend in her 20s who was slowly coming round to the idea of accepting the jab, as it appeared to be safe after all.
Now?
NO WAY. She will never take AZ, or any other vaccine, unless it is compulsory on pain of jailtime. She's been proven right. The government has been lying. The jabs are evil and dangerous.
If 1 million people react like her we have a new and vast pool of unvaxed people who can get very sick or die, menacing the NHS, again
In fairness, a healthy female in her 20s is unlikely to get sick from Covid, and at an infinitesimal risk of dying from it. That said, I am sad to hear that story as I fear, as you imply, there might be more like her.
Why would those under 30 or even 40 bother with vaccine. AZ is a risk. But the mRNA vaccines have questions over long-term safety. I can envisage a low vaccine uptake among the under 40s. That seems to be the feedback from my children. They would rather get immunity from a mild infection rather than risk an innocculation.
A low risk for them, but not for young people with other illnesses and older people who they might pass the infection on to, and remember the vacine isn't perfect.
It's not low risk at all, if you do get Covid in your 20s the risks are miles higher than any of the vaccinations. The caution on AZ vaccine is because the risk of catching Covid due to 30+ million vaccinated people + restrictions means you've got a lowish chance of catching it in the first place AND crucially you can simply replace with another vaccine. The risk of being unvaccinated in the general population once we're reopened is miles higher.
I doubt we know the full risks of AZ , two days ago it was thought 100% safe (in the UK at least ) now its thought 99.999% safe , next week will more data mean its only 99% safe ? How are people who insist it is taken when offered so sure? Why do they trust the government so much? It is made up of largely muppets . AZ has already proven to be unsafe to some , with more data it could prove more unsafe.
How much more data are you after? The more we get, the more we can find out more vanishingly rare events. We've done enough to find one-in-a-million events because we've done millions of jabs. We're not going to suddenly find one-in-a-hundred events now, are we? "Oops, we all missed hundreds of thousands of events while we were scrutinising so hard we could pick up one-in-a-million events"
If it was 99% safe and we've jabbed nearly 20 million, we'd expect 200,000 people to have rolled up at hospital by now (and that's assuming you just mean getting seriously ill; if you're suggesting it's fatal one time in a hundred, then we'd have had 200,000 extra deaths in the past couple of months on top of the covid ones. We'd have noticed)
yes possibly and probably you are right. I just think when you have declared a vaccine safe and then get dodgy stats like AZ has since jabbing then you cannot be confident the government has the right level of risk at this stage. It is not as if it is unheard of that drugs/vaccines in the past have been declared safe then found to be very dangerous. If its not worth the risk for under 30s this week will it not be worth the risk for under 40s next week or second jabs for over 50s in a months time. Trouble is the governmnet have been saying all year we are all at risk whatever age (quite moronically imo) so if they withdraw it from one age group it is not inspiring any confidence at all in it or themselves
I'm not sure these graphs showing the risk during a 16 week period are very helpful. They give a wrongly inflated view of the risks from the vaccine.
Needs a politician to say "we can't stay locked down forever" so pay attention to those high exposure figures.
The 'low exposure risk' graph implied the risk from the vaccine was higher than the risk from covid, which is an absurd misrepresentation. We know covid isn't going to go away so they should assume that people will be exposed to covid at some point and base the risk/benefit profile on that.
Whilst that's true (and the fact that comparing over a 16-week period was pointed out at the press conference as underestimating the Covid risk), it's not quite the point. The 16-week comparison is a reasonable one to make because we have other vaccines coming, and so advising this group not to have the AZ vaccine doesn't prevent them getting protection later (or even no later) from a different vaccine.
The calculations, as @Philip_Thompson pointed out downthread, would be very different indeed if the pandemic was currently raging here and we didn't have alternatives.
Doesn't surprise me to see you sharing such stupidity.
The risk profile for under 30s is wildly different to the risk profile for others.
Well JVTs slide said in 30-40s with low exposure risk
Risk of serious harm AZ is 0.8 per 100k
Covid risk of ICU admission is 2.7 per 100k
... per 16 weeks at very low prevalence. When we open up properly, unless we've hit herd immunity thanks to enough people taking the vaccine, we won't be at very low prevalence. The entire point of the vaccine programme is to reduce covid risk by two strands:
1 - Possibly squashing prevalence down towards zero covid by bazooka-ing the R rate 2 - Making it so that a high prevalence (if #1 doesn't occur) is no longer associated with a high risk of injury or death.
We had a prevalence 30 times the current one at the peak.
You keep claiming prevalence will go up and extrapolating from that but reality from Israel is the polar opposite. Prevalence is still cratering as the vaccine has slashed R.
Thus the "1 - Possibly squashing prevalence down towards zero covid by bazooka-ing the R rate" above. I'm very much hoping that prevalence craters (is bazooka-ed) as per what you've just quoted, but we don't know that for sure yet. Me saying prevalence would go up if we dropped all restrictions when only five million (8%) are double-dosed is not comparing us with Israel. Should the full dropping of restrictions cause R to get above 1, then prevalence will rise, but it should be irrelevant as people will be strongly protected from hospitalisation or death.
Israel lifted their restrictions at the start of February not today. We have more vaccinated now than they did then. Our prevalence is much lower than theirs then too.
The first dose provides the vast bulk of the protection not the second. No need to do a comedy Dave and compare second doses.
Can you provide numbers? What proportion of Israeli populace was double-vaccinated compared to our 8%, and what restrictions were lifted? After all, despite opening up more and more, they still have some restrictions, right now. The restrictions lifted at the start of February were: "Restrictions on travel within and between towns were lifted, Workplaces that do not receive customers were reopened, Open-air nature reserves and parks were reopened"
You seem to be implying that they went to a post-21-June state at the start of February rather than the state we're in right now.
In late February: those who had vaccine passports were allowed entry into gyms, theaters, hotels, and concerts, and entry into synagogues registered to the vaccine passport system.
In early March it was wider, but they definitely hadn't just fully vaccinated 8% by then and it looks like the May level of reopening at a glance.
(and there's a significant difference between one and two doses: one dose reduces infections by about 60%; two doses by 80-90% or so. That means that the effect on R is far greater (your chance of passing it on is between a half and a quarter after two doses than when compared to 1 dose). Maybe one dose will be enough, maybe it won't. It's definitely not certain)
Okay PB brains trust, in light of today’s news, I’d like to ask a question. I’m 40, female, have an autoimmune disease (though mild enough not to be in a priority group) and have already had coronavirus. What is my approximate balance of risk of taking an AZ jab vs future COVID?
I’ve never hesitated taking a vaccination, I fully intend to still get vaccinated and FWIW I detest anti-vaxxers in general. But the risk/benefit ratio for my particular circumstances appears more finely balanced than before. Thoughts?
I think if you have already had Covid then the risks/rewards are much more finely balanced since it still seems vanishingly unlikely that you will catch it again. There is also a female bias in the risk for some reason. I think you might be better advised not to take AZ in that situation but I would be looking for an alternative.
The risk is of course vanishingly small but in your circumstance so is the reward.
There is NOT a female bias to the risk. It is simply a function of more young females having more jabs. That is what they said.,
Why would those under 30 or even 40 bother with vaccine. AZ is a risk. But the mRNA vaccines have questions over long-term safety. I can envisage a low vaccine uptake among the under 40s. That seems to be the feedback from my children. They would rather get immunity from a mild infection rather than risk an innocculation.
A low risk for them, but not for young people with other illnesses and older people who they might pass the infection on to, and remember the vacine isn't perfect.
It's not low risk at all, if you do get Covid in your 20s the risks are miles higher than any of the vaccinations. The caution on AZ vaccine is because the risk of catching Covid due to 30+ million vaccinated people + restrictions means you've got a lowish chance of catching it in the first place AND crucially you can simply replace with another vaccine. The risk of being unvaccinated in the general population once we're reopened is miles higher.
I doubt we know the full risks of AZ , two days ago it was thought 100% safe (in the UK at least ) now its thought 99.999% safe , next week will more data mean its only 99% safe ? How are people who insist it is taken when offered so sure? Why do they trust the government so much? It is made up of largely muppets . AZ has already proven to be unsafe to some , with more data it could prove more unsafe.
I have an anti-vaxxer friend in her 20s who was slowly coming round to the idea of accepting the jab, as it appeared to be safe after all.
Now?
NO WAY. She will never take AZ, or any other vaccine, unless it is compulsory on pain of jailtime. She's been proven right. The government has been lying. The jabs are evil and dangerous.
If 1 million people react like her we have a new and vast pool of unvaxed people who can get very sick or die, menacing the NHS, again
In fairness, a healthy female in her 20s is unlikely to get sick from Covid, and at an infinitesimal risk of dying from it. That said, I am sad to hear that story as I fear, as you imply, there might be more like her.
Comments
Novavax looks like the real MVP for us right now and Moderna a good bridging vaccine until we get volume deliveries of it.
The MHRA were tremendously upfront in that press conference.
How many Novavax per week should we be getting?
The simplest thing would have been this: admit that Yes, there are very rare side effects, but say: we will carry on vaccinating, as the risk to the whole country of non vaccination is far greater than the risks of any jab itself. Which is entirely true
It's 1 in 100,000 FFS, or maybe even 1 in 1,000,000
EESH
Honesty and transparency is critical.
They should just have stuck with the liklihood of death by covid or death by vaccine for the age range chart.
And to give it further context, the all risks chance of anyone in the 25-30yr age range dying in a twelve month period in normal times in the UK is, I think, somewhere around 40 per 100,000.
So the absolute risk from this vaccine, even if the effect is proven, is pretty small.
But the principle with all medicines is that you do not give them unless there is a clear net benefit.
There probably still is for the AZN vaccine, even in the younger cohort, but it is a marginal benefit, so given the existence of alternative vaccine, the updated guidance makes sense (and indeed I predicted it upthread).
If you were living in Brazil right now, it would be an absolute no brainer to get this vaccine even if you're a 20 yr old.
He stole my line!
If I offered you a vaccine today that had a 1% chance of killing you, but protected you against rabies (100% chance of death if infected and untreated) would you take it?
Or would you think, I'm not likely to get rabies so no thanks.
Ibuprofen, not so much (increases the risk of stomach bleeds significantly, for instance). I don't take it at all.
"15.26 Blood clots a 'strong possibility' but more work needed to firm up the link"
https://news.sky.com/story/covid-news-live-latest-uk-updates-coronavirus-robustly-associated-with-risk-of-psychiatric-and-neurological-conditions-12268094
See you next Tuesday.
The thing is, that most of us didn't say there could not be a link to blood clots, but only that (a) there seemed to be a lack of evidence and (b) the benefits of vacination clearly outweighed the possible risks.
Now, with passing of more time and more analysis, (a) seems to have appeared, for a specific type of clot rather than clots in general. However, (b) is still true, for the vast majority of the population here and for everyone in the many countries in Europe that presently have higher infection rates.
Even with hindsight, pausing AZN a few weeks back does not look to have been a net benefit, particularly given the vaccinations were mainly (prevented from) going to older people in countries with higher infection rates
Between Moderna, Pfizer and Novavax we should get around 1.5m doses per week, *just for first doses* in May and about 2m per week in June. In addition we've got the AZ deliveries and Pfizer stockpile for second doses. As I've been saying for a while, I'm not really sure why people are panicking so much.
I think the government may reserve 30m of our Novavax order for a variant fighting reformulation.
It's a bit like saying there is a low risk of death using a pogostick on a motorway because there isn't much traffic at the moment
https://twitter.com/PHE_uk/status/1379819108015992834?s=20
Honestly, this could easily, easily have just been done very quietly with a midnight press release and loads of technical jargon.
When we open up properly, unless we've hit herd immunity thanks to enough people taking the vaccine, we won't be at very low prevalence.
The entire point of the vaccine programme is to reduce covid risk by two strands:
1 - Possibly squashing prevalence down towards zero covid by bazooka-ing the R rate
2 - Making it so that a high prevalence (if #1 doesn't occur) is no longer associated with a high risk of injury or death.
We had a prevalence 30 times the current one at the peak.
So it is quite the plot twist that the MHRA is putting conditions on AZ, while the EMA doesn't.
Personally I would go more for intelligent and conscientious scientists at each institution coming to informed but different conclusions based on the evidence and their understanding of the situation. And that is as it needs to be. They make the calls.
In the modern world, the sensible thing to do is to get out in front, and provide answers to the whole story. Before the Twatter types have time to invent their bullshit.
It just turned out that the EMA's conference didn't say what they expected.
That is the average person's reading of this. Most people aren't great at maths and most people don't obsessively pore over immunological papers and Com Res opinion polls in West Cornwall
The message that screams out from this press conference is, therefore, if you're under 30 (or even under 40, or 50) don't take AZ, it's not worth it, and be more suspicious of vaccines in general
I really really really hope I am wrong, and that the great British public exercise advanced common sense. We shall see
Young people not taking the vaccines are doing two things: they're still taking an unnecessary gamble with their health and well being, and they're also increasing the likelihood of the Government keeping more miserable restrictions in place for longer, under the pretext of rising cases amongst the unprotected.
I mean, I worry that there's a substantial lobby amongst ministers and their advisers that wants to keep as many rules in place for as long as possible regardless, but at least let's try to give them as few excuses as possible for doing so.
https://twitter.com/DarrenGBNews/status/1379343211387363330?s=19
If the risk from covid is low then how can AZ be "a risk"?
And what specific questions are there about long-term safety for mRNA vaccines?
Once a regulator starts down that road, they risk losing all credibility.
Can't be worse than seeing Kay Burley back on our screens. Be interesting to see if they can ask any sensible questions, Brillo was always good at that himself.
The public health people want to have it both ways.
The risks from Covid (and, yes, Long Covid) are absolutely tiny for the healthy under-30s, statistically. Yet for a year, the public health people have been deliberately playing this down for rational public health reasons – they don't want millions of very mobile asymptomatic vectors out there.
Trouble is, they have now just let the cat out of the bag somewhat, with this bloody chart.
Many under-30s will now think, erm, "as they have now confirmed that may risks from the actually disease are so low as to be EVEN LOWER than the effing TINY risks from this vaccine, why would I then have any vaccine at all? What's the point?"
I'm very much hoping that prevalence craters (is bazooka-ed) as per what you've just quoted, but we don't know that for sure yet. Me saying prevalence would go up if we dropped all restrictions when only five million (8%) are double-dosed is not comparing us with Israel.
Should the full dropping of restrictions cause R to get above 1, then prevalence will rise, but it should be irrelevant as people will be strongly protected from hospitalisation or death.
The slightly larger numbers for women could quite easily be because, as healthcare workers, more young women than men have had the vaccine.
I’ve never hesitated taking a vaccination, I fully intend to still get vaccinated and FWIW I detest anti-vaxxers in general. But the risk/benefit ratio for my particular circumstances appears more finely balanced than before. Thoughts?
Now?
NO WAY. She will never take AZ, or any other vaccine, unless it is compulsory on pain of jailtime. She's been proven right. The government has been lying. The jabs are evil and dangerous.
If 1 million people react like her we have a new and vast pool of unvaxed people who can get very sick or die, menacing the NHS, again
The full risks are basically none.
There might be some link to blood clots, but as they happen anyway with roughly the frequency that they're being observed then the only issue is that it may change blood clot behavior.
These very rare occurrences should be looked at, of course.
Unless we achieve herd immunity the chances of catching this virus if you are not immunised must tend towards 100% not 1%. We have 4.3m recorded cases already and probably more than that again that went unrecorded. If that is right then the direct comparators are 1 or 1.1 in 100k of a risk and 6.3 in 100k of dying. The risk of being seriously ill is of course much greater.
These charts skew that risk by measuring risk over relatively short periods of time. I really don't understand why they did that.
I believe the MRHA has just jeopardised British lives, big time, and also the British economy, by potentially delaying the roadmap. It is not a moment for my normal discourse of quiet understatement
Meanwhile in the developing world where this cheap and easily store vaccine is a godsend...
Unless you have applied one of those flint things first as a shaving tool.
The first dose provides the vast bulk of the protection not the second. No need to do a comedy Dave and compare second doses.
One observation - I wonder how many European countries would have had so many very senior scientists/doctors from ethnic minorities delivering such a press conference?
And that fucking graph with low exposure was imbecilic
I agree with your point about mixed messaging but the problem actually is that decision-makers have either not wised up to long Covid fast enough (March to December last year) or have forgotten about it (December to now, if that press conference is anything to go by).
The public messaging could have been extremely simple. The risks of mortality for the old are high but low in the young. The risks for morbidity are high in both groups. Why this keeps getting forgotten or is not made clear, I am unsure of. Probably because it is harder to count morbidity than it is body bags.
The more we get, the more we can find out more vanishingly rare events. We've done enough to find one-in-a-million events because we've done millions of jabs.
We're not going to suddenly find one-in-a-hundred events now, are we?
"Oops, we all missed hundreds of thousands of events while we were scrutinising so hard we could pick up one-in-a-million events"
If it was 99% safe and we've jabbed nearly 20 million, we'd expect 200,000 people to have rolled up at hospital by now (and that's assuming you just mean getting seriously ill; if you're suggesting it's fatal one time in a hundred, then we'd have had 200,000 extra deaths in the past couple of months on top of the covid ones. We'd have noticed)
Hmm.
The risk is of course vanishingly small but in your circumstance so is the reward.
On the other hand, Covid kills and it also causes complications, even in the young. There are also broader deleterious implications for all age groups, including young people, in leaving large numbers if unvaccinated adults wandering about the country. Beyond that, we are also being entreated to listen to the advice of panels of scientific experts who give a very good impression of knowing what they are doing. It is not, thank goodness, as if we are simply being invited to accept the word of ministers in this case. If we were I'd be a lot more worried.
Beyond this, the concern that this specific medicine could be less safe than we think it is and we might find out about more extremely rare effects later applies equally to all the other vaccines. They are all new. What we do know, however, is that (a) the rollout is being monitored very, very carefully to look out for any problems - and I think we can be reasonably confident that no widespread and disastrous side effects have occurred, or they would've been identified by now - and (b) there is a lot of evidence that the vaccines are highly effective against Covid-19 and are helping to crush it. And Covid-19 is vastly more dangerous to our health, our economy and our society than these vaccines. There is no good reason to refuse any of them, unless it is being done based on sound medical advice.
On vaccines, as a 43yo man who is patiently waiting for a vaccine so I can see my parents safely again, I will take any UK-approved vaccine that is offered to me right now. I fear I'm in for a month long wait, unfortunately.
I just wish they were better communicators: white black or brown. It was so poorly done. It also looked amateurish, with wobbly cameras and graphics, and lots of mumbling and muttering.
The EMA looked much more impressive, just by saying almost nothing, boringly, on high and gleaming podiums. Tedious facts and very little opinion, good camerawork and Teutonic dullness. That is the way to go with this stuff
from case data
from hospitalisations
The calculations, as @Philip_Thompson pointed out downthread, would be very different indeed if the pandemic was currently raging here and we didn't have alternatives.
What proportion of Israeli populace was double-vaccinated compared to our 8%, and what restrictions were lifted?
After all, despite opening up more and more, they still have some restrictions, right now.
The restrictions lifted at the start of February were: "Restrictions on travel within and between towns were lifted, Workplaces that do not receive customers were reopened, Open-air nature reserves and parks were reopened"
You seem to be implying that they went to a post-21-June state at the start of February rather than the state we're in right now.
In late February: those who had vaccine passports were allowed entry into gyms, theaters, hotels, and concerts, and entry into synagogues registered to the vaccine passport system.
In early March it was wider, but they definitely hadn't just fully vaccinated 8% by then and it looks like the May level of reopening at a glance.
(and there's a significant difference between one and two doses: one dose reduces infections by about 60%; two doses by 80-90% or so. That means that the effect on R is far greater (your chance of passing it on is between a half and a quarter after two doses than when compared to 1 dose). Maybe one dose will be enough, maybe it won't. It's definitely not certain)