And now the bloody vaccine trial is paused due to a potential severe side effect

[Worriedmum999]

As if this week could get any worse. Cases up! Deaths up! Heading back to more restrictions and potentially lockdowns with the second wave.

I have had a really down few days. I’m vulnerable and scared of leaving my children without a mother. I’m scared that they are going to school and we can no longer shield. I’m scared of what more isolation will do to them.

I was pinning my hopes on the Oxford vaccine. Probably stupid I know. There has been no glimmer of light with this pandemic. Everything has gone wrong and turned to shit. Now it looks like we’ll have no vaccine in the near future. At least we were front of the queue for the Oxford one. If we have to wait for some from another country we could be in this hell for years...and that’s if any will even work.

So down tonight

I think the government want to make people (probably me included) who are basically staying at home and not spending in the hospitality, entertainment or travel and tourism industry in the hope of a vaccine in the next couple of months realise that it might be next spring or later, so we might as well take reasonable precautions and get back at it (following rules of course).

But keeping safe as much as we can control is a hard habit to break and we've been doing it for 6 months now already. A reliable antibody test would help those who find they have antibodies, but the government does want to promote a two-tier society or risk people being carriers (although I think if you have antibodies you can't be a carrier as your body kills the virus, it is not the same as being infected asymptomatically).

That may be why there is a focus on the vaccine not being a reliable or quick solution and details being leaked etc.

Sir Patrick Vallance at the press conference reassuring on this and other vaccines

obviously I forgot a 'not'! The government does not want to promote a two-tier society.

Here:-

And here:

Unfortunately I think my parents in their 70s are not going find the prospect of a vaccine sometime next year reassuring.
They, like many their age, are not going anywhere or doing anything, bar their daily exercise and going to get their flu jab

It is a very bleak situation for the vulnerable and elderly facing months more stuck at home isolated, especially those without family nearby. They really are counting on a vaccine, as soon as possible.

Well considering how long the flu jab has been around I wouldn't worry as that's not been particularly effective has it?

@Hereinthesticks

It is a very bleak situation for the vulnerable and elderly facing months more stuck at home isolated, especially those without family nearby. They really are counting on a vaccine, as soon as possible.

I think vaccines don’t always take that well in older people due to their immune systems, which is quite a lot still die of flu even when they’ve had it.

@IrmaFayLear

What pissed me off was the almost gleeful way this was reported in the press and on the BBC. Instead of a tone of disappointment, there was a tone of schadenfreude, seemingly being pleased that the Oxford trial had possibly failed.

Yep, there was a few on my SM like that too. Moaning about the vaccine “not being safe or properly tested”, and now it’s being paused due to the testing being done properly, still not happy either.

I work in clinical trials and I am not worried. It’s not unusual to get a serious adverse effect on a trial. SAE could be a life threatening event but also one that requires hospitalisation. A subject could have an unrelated event i.e stroke or heart attack and that would be reported as SAE. It shows that safety is paramount and this is a highly regulated environment. This may or may not be related to the vaccine.

@Hereinthesticks

Unfortunately I think my parents in their 70s are not going find the prospect of a vaccine sometime next year reassuring. They, like many their age, are not going anywhere or doing anything, bar their daily exercise and going to get their flu jab

My parents are the opposite going about as normal but being careful they were getting depressed

@Ellsbells12 - yes, I worry my parents will get (more) depressed. But they are high-risk simply due to their age. It is a worry either way, but an effective vaccine in the short term would give them something to hold on to. At the moment it is like a carrot that keeps getting moved further away, i.e. end August, then autumn, now next year.

I think vaccines don’t always take that well in older people due to their immune systems, which is quite a lot still die of flu even when they’ve had it. Are you trying to make us feel worse with this?! Really there are many people with lives on hold waiting for a coronavirus vaccine from whatever country or pharmaceutical company.

@Hereinthesticks

I think vaccines don’t always take that well in older people due to their immune systems, which is quite a lot still die of flu even when they’ve had it. Are you trying to make us feel worse with this?! Really there are many people with lives on hold waiting for a coronavirus vaccine from whatever country or pharmaceutical company.

Erm, no? Perhaps shows that “keeping lives on hold” for something that might not come quickly is maybe a bit foolish - there was never any guarantee as to timing. My parents are in their 70s too and my dad has cancer so I do understand but wanting a vaccine to appear quickly doesn’t mean it will happen, nor will hoping there are no limitations mean there won’t be any 🤷🏼‍♀️

Mine are the same @Ellsbells12 they’re now getting out and about a bit, who can blame them. If I was in my twilight years I doubt I’d want to spend them sitting in the house for months on end for a vaccine that might never come:

Many vulnerable and elderly are keeping their lives, if not fully 'on hold', then certainly very scaled down. That is because the science shows they are high-risk and are the section of the population most likely to be hospitalised or die. For them it is very bleak and their light at the end of the tunnel was a vaccine. I think returning to normal life, even with precautions, is not a very favourable prospect either, especially given how things went in March and April for the elderly who unwittingly got infected before lockdown.

Obviously it is not an issue to argue about, but there are people on both sides of this problem and both ways of behaving are valid.

@Fosler

Well considering how long the flu jab has been around I wouldn't worry as that's not been particularly effective has it?

But flu virus and the vaccine are very different to Covid and any vaccine. The flu, iirc, mutates much more quickly than coronaviruses. There are many flu viruses circulating at one time and for the vaccine they have to predict the strain that will be most dominant that year. I think that's correct?

Also won't elderly and vulnerable benefit if there is a high vaccine uptake so that the virus is circulating at low levels in the general population? Then chances for elderly and vulnerable picking it up from an infected person statistically lowered? Herd immunity achieved through vaccination?

I think Hereinthesticks is right - it’s a message to say that there’s no point in hiding till there’s a vaccine as one is not imminent. I’ve seen people on MN stating that they want to keep their dcs off school “until there is a vaccine” and in real life relatives saying “we’ll get together when there’s a vaccine”.

I think we have to accept that you are going to have to home school for years and never see many of your family again if you are sticking to the vaccine solution.

I had to make the scary decision to wave dd off to school this week (I was in shielded category). I can’t incarcerate my dcs forever, and forever is a long time.

Re: elderly, I know that last year there were two flu vaccines- one ordinary one and a super-charged one for over 70s as the vaccine does indeed ave trouble taking in the elderly.

I think vaccines don’t always take that well in older people due to their immune systems, which is quite a lot still die of flu even when they’ve had it.

The flu jab will be different to the Covid jab.... The flu’s biochemistry and annual lifecycle (a dominant strain spreading in winter and retreating to the tropics in the summer to mix with other strains) makes it highly susceptible to mutation, so when the vaccine is developed each they’re trying to hit a moving target - sometimes they get closer than others. Covid seems much more stable - like other coronaviruses.

@Hereinthesticks

Obviously it is not an issue to argue about, but there are people on both sides of this problem and both ways of behaving are valid.

Of course. I think if I was elderly I’d rather get out and about a wee bit safely though than spend my last years sitting in the house.

An update:
www.statnews.com/2020/09/09/astrazeneca-covid19-vaccine-trial-hold-patient-report/