I think you should really calm down a little bit.
Peter wrote:
It’s going to be awfully interesting which vaccine “we” will get. The Pfizer one seems ~95% effective and there is good data. The AstraZeneca (“Oxford”) one is ~60% and the 90% figure is supported only by sparse data and looks like a cockup anyway.
I would call it a partial cockup, which can be corrected by an extended trial. Though quoting the higher immunity rate for the non-representative sub-sample is premature.
But even 60% effectiveness is useful if you can roll their vaccine out easily (fridge temperatures) and relatively cheaply.
With say a 60% vaccine take-up that means 36% of the population are immune through the vaccine, and probably 10% of the ‘anti-vaxxers’ are already immune through the virus, so that would give 40% immunity.
Then if mild ‘social distancing’ measures on their own, with no vaccine, could keep R0 under 1.67, that 40% population immunity keeps actual R below 1.
Yes.
However it seems that the need for the extended trial will delay its introduction until “late March” (read: April) so the Pfizer one must be the only game in town right now, for the vaccinations they are talking about in December.
Yesterday’s ‘Times’ quotes ‘the Oxford team’ and ‘ministers’ as saying the UK licence could come before year-end on the existing data, and Astrazeneca’s CEO saying US licensing was unlikely without a further trial. I understand Astrazeneca are already manufacturing it, so the UK availability could be earlier than March/April.
It’s going to be awfully interesting which vaccine “we” will get. The Pfizer one seems ~95% effective and there is good data. The AstraZeneca (“Oxford”) one is ~60% and the 90% figure is supported only by sparse data and looks like a cockup anyway.
It will be interesting to see if people have a choice, or if they are simply told “this is the one available to you”.
I can imagine some preferring the Pfizer/BioNtec or Moderna one because of the higher effective rate, and others preferring the Oxford/AstraZeneca one because it is a conventional vaccine and doesn’t use ground breaking technology.
But offering a choice might make the rollout harder to manage.
It’s been stated there won’t be a choice.
Possibly if you wait a bit you may be able to get it privately. PROB100 you will a few months down the road.
60% is not much good really. I can achieve > 99% just by carrying on with my existing lifestyle 
and the only urgent use of a vaccine would be to go up a ski lift, and looking at the likely behaviour there I would want the 95% one and a FFP3 mask!!
In the US, I’ll call around and find the medical facility that’s offering what I want.
We could do a EuroGA group vaccination discount
Peter wrote:
We could do a EuroGA group vaccination discount
You might want to call Putin and see what you get. He is the only one on the (internal) market so far… I know a couple who went home to Moscow to get vaccined… don’t blame them.
60% is totally useless, particularly regarding that it will be very difficult to convince people to actually vaccine themselfs at all. Well, more available for those who do. I just hope that those who refuse will be seregated and prevented from spreading more disease.
Mooney_Driver wrote:
60% is totally useless,
Its more than adequate and perhaps make little difference, since it looks like the RNA vaccines will be much harder to distribute. In the UK they aren’t any longer targeting those that aren’t the most vulnerable first, because its too difficult (yet) to bring the vacinne to them. Instead they are going to vacinne hospital staff first since they can come to the vacinne distribution point.
Minors won’t be offered the vacinne in the first place, if 60% of the most vulnerable can’t get sick, and those they aren’t all that vulnerable, are either vaccinated or have already had it then the risk is vastly reduced, and before long you at around 90% that can’t get sick.
