Surely a vaccine may never happen?

[tangochutney]

I keep hearing family/friends saying stuff along the lines of ‘well until they sort out the vaccine’ but I was thinking of all the diseases that have been around forever that they’ve not managed to vaccinate. I’m sure I read they’ve been working on making a vaccination for chlamydia for 50 years with zero success plus so so many other infections and viruses- surely they can’t just work on it for a while and magic one up in a certain timeframe like people seem to think.

[VenusOfWillendorf]

With human trials aren’t there four or five phases to go through?
There are four phases - they vary depending on type of disease area but in general - the First is very small for safety and toxicity, the Second is dose finding for efficacy and safety, Third is large scale (several hundred patients in many countries) for efficacy and keeping an eye on safety to detect the range of side effects and the Fourth is post-marketing.F

A vaccine will need to go through all of these, unless it already exists for something else (BCG is being looked into) which is possible but unlikely.

The treatments they are looking at are almost all already on the market but for a different illness. So they already have established safety and can concentrate on efficacy, meaning a treatment is far more likely to happen sooner than a vaccine.

[Qasd]

I think that a lot of scientists have been explaining the vaccine time lines, issues etc. But a lot of people did not want to believe it because we are being sold it as the only answer. In reality human trial does not equal effective vaccine they have trailed hiv vaccines they just did not work. Vaccines do take a lot of work, and the idea that the human trail is a rubber stamp to mass vaccines production in October is ludicrous! If we get a vaccine in two years (so end of 2021) that will shave two years off the record and be incredible and we will need another year for production and distribution(so end if 2023) In the meantime we are going to have to live with virus though it is not going anywhere!

[Sunshinegirl82]

So why are the people developing the vaccines and the companies producing the vaccines saying something else entirely?

When major pharmaceutical companies are joining forces to get things moving I’m not sure why we are using “the norm” to compare things to? Surely it’s clear that things are different?

[B1rdbra1n]

Hopefully we'll be able to refine the treatments, perhaps that could improve survival rates significantly?
It is all getting to sound a bit end of life as We know it though 😳 isn't it 😥
Hopefully it will mutate in the direction of 'not as harmful'?

[Daffodil101]

I think a lot of people don’t want there to be a vaccine, judging by MN recently.

I have never seen such pessimistic, gleeful, doom-mongering, hand rubbing at the thought of things never getting back to normal.

[EmMac7]

I think a vaccine is more likely that not. I doubt it will be 100% effective and the period it will be protective may only be short (1-3 years) but enough to establish some sort of rolling herd immunity.

But there are steps that cannot be skipped. I’m sceptical we’ll have it before late next year.

[ErrolTheDragon]

I think a lot of people don’t want there to be a vaccine, judging by MN recently.

I don't think it's a lot of people, just the same few naysayers.

[crustycrab]

"I think a vaccine is more likely that not. I doubt it will be 100% effective and the period it will be protective may only be short (1-3 years) but enough to establish some sort of rolling herd immunity."

Eh? 🙈

[Daffodil101]

You’re probably right, but my god, they’re loud!

I’m
Quite confident in a vaccine before too long, given that a vaccine was already partly developed, but then I’ve always been an optimist.

[crustycrab]

Ffs. I'm just going to relieve myself of MN shortly but fucking hell 🙈

Stop spouting your bullshit while my close family member works on treatments (more likely) and vaccines (much less likely)

[crustycrab]

"a vaccine was already partly developed"

You know that's not possible surely? 😣

[SailingAwayIntoSunrise]

And no guarantee everyone will take it, so we'll still rely on herd immunity through infection

Herd immunity or Darwism 🤔

[crustycrab]

@Sunshinesky1981 the people in the labs you're talking about doubt it'll be this year. And know it might be never. You're talking absolute rubbish

[crustycrab]

have never seen such pessimistic, gleeful, doom-mongering, hand rubbing at the thought of things never getting back to normal.

[crustycrab]

Sorry, posted too soon but really? You believe that?

[DamnYankee]

Not surely. Possible. Not probable.
We're just going to have to live with it (whatever your definition of that is) for now.

[Pixxie7]

There is a vaccine for pneumonia.

[Sunshinesky1981]

@crustycrab wrong sunshine

[DippyAvocado]

we'll still rely on herd immunity through infection

If this is an effective strategy, why bother creating any vaccines at all? Why did we not just let polio and measles run freely through the population?

[XDownwiththissortofthingX]

The estimable Professor Hugh Pennington seems to believe the development of a vaccine is both doubtful, and a long way off yet -

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-52457323

"There is already evidence suggesting that immunity against Covid-19 is not particularly strong after infection.

"Many people don't really develop very much in the way of antibodies but they recover from the infection, which might suggest that traditional vaccines are not going to be particularly effective.

"I think probably the best thing we can hope for is a vaccine or a set of vaccines which will be partially protective, and they may not work as well in the elderly because most vaccines don't.

"So to put all our money on a vaccine as the way we can end the current crisis I think will be a mistake, because we may never get to that point."

[ChaBishkoot]

I can’t give away too much but:

• the Oxford team’s monkey data is looking good.
  
• several other vaccines including Moderna’s are worth keeping an eye on.
  
• there is a difference between ‘we will have a vaccine’ and ‘your GP will offer you one.’ There are 22 (I think) different kinds of flu vaccines that fulfill the global demand for it. It will take possibly until next summer to fulfil the commercial demand for a vaccine. It is likely that the Oxford vaccine will be given to U.K. healthcare workers.
  
• we are not looking at 100% efficacy for the vaccine. More 50-60%, something like flu. A more efficacious vaccine will take a few more years. There are ALSO trials for those being planned but that’s a longer process.
  

And you need 3 phases of trials. Several are in Phase 1/2 and heading to Phase 3. It helps that vast sums of money are being poured into trials at the moment and all other vaccine trials are on hold so the process is a bit quicker. It will still however have to go through the same regulatory process.

Finally, as I said above a vaccine trial is one thing but producing a billion doses+ of a vaccine that is stable, that can be packaged, shipped and remains stable is a whole other matter.

[Reginabambina]

Well they’re already trailing one. If all goes well we might find that there is already a vaccine. We won’t know until we know.

[feesh]

Sarah Gilbert’s work is really promising and I think they’re definitely going to have something ready by the autumn. In fact, the manufacturing commitment is (according to the latest Panorama) in the “tens of millions” by September.

The clinical trials started at the end of last month, the technology is tried and tested and the earlier stages of trials had already produced hopeful results.

The global impetus to tackle this, the biggest ever threat to global capitalism and global economies, is huge and that is a force that has never been exerted before on vaccine production. I’m extremely optimistic.

[Sunshinegirl82]

@crustycrab are you ok? Obviously nothing is definite but I’m pretty sure they’ve got at least a vague hope it will work or producing a million doses for September seems a bit of a wast of time.

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.bbc.com/news/amp/business-52483359

[Sunshinegirl82]

@ChaBishkoot

Well that all sounds pretty positive to me. I’ve never expected to actually be personally vaccinated this year (I’m healthy and in my 30’s so I’m expecting to be at the back of the queue which is as it should be) but if we had something that made a significant difference and was in the early stages of mass production by the end of the year I think that would be fantastic.

I don’t think it makes much difference to what we do more widely, we still need to exit lock down slowly and carefully but I think to have the potential on the horizon is really positive.