Good News Thread Number 4. Because that positivity just keeps on coming!

[FuzzyPuffling]

Here it is....number four thread of science and positivity!

J&J single dose efficiency trials results are due soon and approval should be given late January / early February. 50 million doses ordered. Sounds positive!

Israel seem to be storming through their vaccination program. It’ll be interesting to watch (hopefully) their cases and deaths drop over the next month or two.
As that’ll be us too following behind

@DobbyTheHouseElk

I’m on the verge of a bad anxiety attack from reading those school threads. I keep getting drawn in.

I want to hibernate til spring when the world will be in a better place.

I think the criticism directed at the vaccine program and the response to covid is very politically motivated. Trying to bring down the government by undermining everything.

I think we are doing so well with the vaccine compared to other countries. No one is laughing at us. In fact they are buying our vaccine.

I stayed off of MN almost completely from March-June, it was not helpful to my state of mind. Might be time for another break!

I went for a walk on the beach today with my friend. She works for the NHS and knows we've been shielding so before she came out she did a covid test ( which was happily negative) That is one of the most thoughtful things anyone has done for me!
What a belter!

@Crazycatlady83

J&J single dose efficiency trials results are due soon and approval should be given late January / early February. 50 million doses ordered. Sounds positive!

Actually the rise in cases has been a positive for the vaccine trials. More “events” and therefore more data. A lack of circulating virus in the summer delayed the Oxford trial here but will be useful for the Johnson one

It felt like guerilla gardening or something.

That really made me laugh Countess!

The good thing about the jnj vaccine is that it started its 6000 participant UK trial in November, so hopefully it will offer some concrete evidence about its effectiveness against the new strain.

I don’t know what happened to the imperial vaccine, I haven’t heard anything for ages.

I know there are a few more vaccines in the pipe line.

@sashagabadon that’s true. I read that it includes participants age range 16 - 84 so a good broad data should be collected!

Last I heard about the Imperial Vaccine was that they wanted to do challenge trials starting in January 2021. But I wonder if that’s necessary now the increase in cases?

www.ft.com/content/c0ae3056-ac74-4171-b7bc-5e84fd203f3b

And look at this article in the FT. Germany looking on with envy at our vaccination program (and Israel and US too)
If I posted that on any other thread I’d get accused of xenophobia or British exceptionalism or something worse

I don't suppose you could cut and paste a paragraph, seen as I'm too cheap to spring for a subscription?

Sorry! Here it is, hope this works ok. Here is a bit. The comments are interesting. Generally praising the U.K. strategy!

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<a class="break-all" href="https://www.ft.com/content/c0ae3056-ac74-4171-b7bc-5e84fd203f3b" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">www.ft.com/content/c0ae3056-ac74-4171-b7bc-5e84fd203f3b</a>

The German government is facing awkward questions about why the country that developed the first approved Covid-19 vaccine has so few supplies of the jab, with vaccination rates in Germany lagging far behind the US, UK and Israel.

Jens Spahn, the health minister, pleaded with Germans to have patience. “Throughout the world, supplies of the vaccine are tight,” he told reporters on Wednesday. But he insisted that the situation would ease as more vaccines were approved.

Germans have been angered by statistics showing that more than 640,000 people have already received the Covid-19 jab in Israel, compared with only 78,000 in Germany. Rates of inoculation are also much higher in the UK, which started vaccinations earlier than the EU, and the US. Yet Germany is the home of BioNTech, which developed the Covid-19 vaccine together with Pfizer.

“Sometimes German politicians are so proud of themselves that they forget to learn from the best of the world,” said Marco Buschmann, an MP with the opposition Free Democrats, referring to Israel’s plan to vaccinate most of its population by the end of March.

German officials have complained that they are not receiving as many batches of the vaccine as promised from the central government. Dilek Kalayci, health minister for Berlin, said she had been told that a delivery of 29,250 doses scheduled to arrive in the first week of January had now been cancelled.

“That makes things very difficult for us because we had done all our planning on the basis of these commitments,” she told RBB radio. “I’m angry — the scarcity of the vaccine is a problem for the start of [the] vaccination campaign in Germany.” She said the capital had so far only received a total of 58,500 doses — enough for residents of care homes, but not for other risk groups.

The state of Brandenburg, which surrounds Berlin, also announced on Wednesday that it would not be receiving any consignments of vaccine in the first week of January.

Whatever you do don’t watch Casualty which is on now.They have really gone to town on it.

Thanks for that article Sasha. It's good to get a little wider perspective.

just turned casualty off...its all depressing enough without watching a drama about it!

Part 2 of same article

But Germany’s ability to obtain more doses is constrained. As an EU member state, it is part of the EU-wide scheme for procuring and distributing the vaccine. Mr Spahn said Berlin had consciously decided to “take this European path”, which meant countries could not negotiate bilaterally with the vaccine-producers in parallel with the EU’s own scheme. Germany would, the minister added, buy up all doses that other European countries failed to claim from the EU contingent.

Another problem is that Germany put big bets on vaccines being developed by companies such as Sanofi and CureVac, which have so far failed to win regulatory approval. When those bets were being placed, no one knew which vaccine would be approved first, Mr Spahn said.

Mr Spahn said that by the summer, most people in Germany who wanted to be inoculated would have received the vaccine. However, others are more ambitious. After UK authorities approved the new vaccine developed by Oxford university and AstraZeneca on Wednesday, health secretary Matt Hancock said it meant the country would be able to exit the pandemic “by the spring”.

Thanks so much for that @sashagabadon. It's really interesting. I think Germany must have a lot more trust in their government than we do, I can only imagine the shitstorm if we were shipping out the Oxford vaccine by the million while we were left with so little. Hopefully Pfizer can increase their output. I don't think the Sanofi vaccine is coming out any time soon.

sashaganadon thank you. That’s so interesting to read it from the German POV. I feel like we are doing well.

Thank you for posting that article sasha makes for very interesting reading.
Stupid question but is the Oxford vaccine actually being manufactured in the UK??

This thread is awesome by the way.

Everywhere but we'll manufacture the bulk of the doses that we require although our initial doses are coming from ... Belgium ? ..I think.

Sorry, that was gibberish, I have one eye on Cobra Kai. I mean, it's being manufactured across the world but we'll be able to manufacture most of our own doses.

@GoldenOmber

Indeed. I am not a fan of this government at all but I don’t see how politicising every single thing about the pandemic response helps anything.

Reminding myself that however dire the current situation looks, it’s not last spring any more. Cavalry’s already in sight coming over the hill in the form of millions of vaccine doses, and more and more people are being vaccinated every day.

I agree with this.

At times like these you really need the distraction of Mumsnet and I love some of the normal fun threads but there are hardly any on lots of days.

As has been said, we're not Pollyannas on here. I can read some not cheery news as well. But, really, there's only been this thread with good news, competing with hundreds of doom laden threads that basically all saying the same thing over and over. The relentless negativity can become a feeding frenzy over there, with plenty of speculation and actual untruths spoken of as fact.

Very few countries have had a great time over the year, even Germany have had tough numbers and France had terrible numbers for weeks from about August. It doesn't help that it's come at the same time as Brexit.

I trust the NHS, even if it is underfunded. I trust our regulators. We've also been lucky to have world class scientists. As there are also in many other countries.

Feeling defeated today read an article going to take 5 years to get Bach to normal I feel horrendous any more good news ?

@Spiratedaway

Feeling defeated today read an article going to take 5 years to get Bach to normal I feel horrendous any more good news ?

‘Normal’ is subjective though. If normal means meeting friends and family and going on holiday then it won’t be 5 years.

If we are talking full recovery from economic fall out due to Covid & Brexit then maybe it will be.

I’ve said this on other threads when people have stated that they think things will be ‘normal’ by X month and they get shot down. But the question is, what is normal for you? If you’re a frequent traveller and gig go-we then your normal will take longer than someone’s who isn’t.

Doom scrolled through the schools threads. Not doing that again.
A neighbour (icu pharmacist) was vaccinated last week - apparently they are going to do all the staff at our huge hospital in 10 days