Coronavirus in the UK - news, lockdown and discussion

[littlebabyjesus]

The lead researcher was talking earlier today of the issues they will have in scaling up and thought it would take 2+ years to get to hundreds of millions of units.

If I were a politician hearing that, I'd be asking what they would need to speed that up. Imagine you have the world's resources at your disposal, what could you do with them? Maybe it's nothing, but I would doubt that.

 

[Supine]

Isn't the logistical problem of scaling up the bit that could be expedited in a way we have never seen before

Yes and all the effort will be done. There is plenty of talk about starting to build manufacturing capability now - at risk - before the final product is determined.

I'm sure it's worth doing but it's hard in the current climate. I'm working on projects at the moment that are stuck as pharma factories are not letting people on site or equipment suppliers can't staff equipment builds. It's a really difficult time to get stuff done.

 

[William of Walworth]

One leading UK group with a novel vaccine is expecting 18-24 months at best to go from where they are (post animal model/pre human trials) to verification, (hopefully) approval and mass production.

Another UK group's vaccine will enter human clinical trials later this week at a London hospital. The lead researcher was talking earlier today of the issues they will have in scaling up and thought it would take 2+ years to get to hundreds of millions of units.

Points taken

Is it the mass production aspect that would be the biggest part of the delay then?

littlebabyjesus was suggesting just above (#8847) that the pressure to scale up vaccine production ASAP would be pretty large.

I'm convinced I've also seen recent discussion on here concerning shorter timeframes for vaccine verification -- meaning a shorter timeframe just as a possibility.

I'll let those who've talked (informedly) along those lines add their bit if they want to -- I'm no scientist .

 

[Azrael]

You're right, William. However 18 months also isn't a given maximum either. It could take longer.

I am also hopeful about the power of the energy being put into this and its potential to produce results. But we shouldn't be relying on it. Strikes me that the UK government is kind of relying on some miracle science way out of their mess, rather than proactively taking the steps needed in case that doesn't happen.

Exactly my position. Since so much of the failure to develop a (human) coronavirus vaccine to date rests on lack of will and resources, I'm cautiously optimistic that one will be available a lot sooner than the 18 months mantra.

But it can't be relied on, and its absence mustn't become an excuse for inactivity. Not only do we have the tools to fight SARS-CoV-2 without a vaccine, they successfully eliminated its predecessor from the face of the earth. Wish advocates of test/trace/isolate in the media made a lot more of this. Yes, it was a different disease, but you must fight your corner with all you have.

Thankfully it appears that New Zealand and now Australia's successes are having a real impact here, with the Mail claiming that Johnson, terrified by his ICU experience, wants to get Britain close to where Australia is. We'll see.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Thankfully it appears that New Zealand and now Australia's successes are having a real impact here, with the Mail claiming that Johnson, terrified by his ICU experience, wants to get Britain close to where Australia is. We'll see.

That does not fill me with confidence. First, we all had to suffer because of Johnson's arrogance and reckless disregard for this thing. Now, we all have to suffer because he's become born again. It's not all about him ffs.

 

[Supine]

I'm convinced I've also seen recent discussion on here concerning shorter timeframes for vaccine verification -- meaning a shorter timeframe just as a possIble

Shorter timeframes for repurposed medicines are much easier. Drugs like remdesivir or kaletra have already proven safe in humans so trials to determine efficacy with covid are shorter and can be fast tracked.

New vaccines are a different ball game. They simply have to be proven safe before it's safe to prove that they work. There is lots of streamlining with regulators now so world records will be broken in getting vaccines through the regulatory hurdles. They must be proven safe and trials take time. The consequence of getting that wrong would be huge.

Human trials are starting this week so it looks like the industry is stepping up. Remember though, most pharma products fail clinical trials so don't get too excited about any particular vaccine that makes it into the news.

 

[2hats]

If I were a politician hearing that, I'd be asking what they would need to speed that up. Imagine you have the world's resources at your disposal, what could you do with them? Maybe it's nothing, but I would doubt that.

One of the novel vaccines lends itself to being scaled up massively, very quickly (it's synthetic so faster than cell line production plus it uses the recipients own body to manufacture the antigens rather than having to produce them all in vitro and then introduce them directly). But because it is novel they need to take the time to be sure it is safe. Though it's already demonstrated promise in animal models and is now scheduled for human trials later in June, perhaps yielding first results by September.

 

[Azrael]

That does not fill me with confidence. First, we all had to suffer because of Johnson's arrogance and reckless disregard for this thing. Now, we all have to suffer because he's become born again. It's not all about him ffs.

Unfortunately, while he's P.M., it is about him. I'd happily have Johnson quarantined to an island with anyone fool enough to move in, but when the alternative is "run it hot" hard right fanatics, I'll put up with the oaf if it moves Britain to the only policy that offers us a way out.

All that currently stands between us and "let it rip" are Johnson and Hancock. Dear God, what a shite state of affairs to be in.

 

[two sheds]

If I were a politician hearing that, I'd be asking what they would need to speed that up.

You'd be fuck all use in the British government then.

 

[2hats]

Is it the mass production aspect that would be the biggest part of the delay then?

One aspect. Before that there is collecting sufficient data to prove safety to the satisfaction of the regulatory authorities.

I'm convinced I've also seen recent discussion on here concerning shorter timeframes for vaccine verification -- meaning a shorter timeframe just as a possibility.

Yes. So the entire process might only take 2 years, instead of 5, 8 or 10 years.

 

[Azrael]

To illustrate how precarious things are, while the Torygraph news section's shockingly returned to reporting actual news, op-ed's split between those arguing for a return to the old school public health approach used so successfully in Asia, and laissez-faire fanatics who've engineered a false choice between years of lockdown and taking it on the chin.

They're deaf to the third option of suppressing the virus via contact tracing because making "hard choices" between horrific death tolls suits their faux-macho temperament, and their small state dogma makes them unable to conceive of effective government action.

This wretched defeatism is the opposite of the strongman image they have of themselves, but they're blind to that, too.

 

[Part-timah]

My gut reaction to the bolded bit is that 2 to 3 years is on the outside edge of extreme pessimism -- given the amount of research currently going on.

I've no more knowledge or prediction skills than you, but let's just say that I'm (somewhat) less pessimistic.

Have you learned nothing from the last few months? The safety blanket of what you want to believe isn’t real.

 

[Azrael]

All these vaccine predictions are surely a needless distraction. Maybe it'll come in a few months, maybe a few years, who knows. We know multiple teams are working as fast as they can, and are being given resources. That's the important thing.

Focus is best spent on the two things that can help now: building up a robust suppression system so lockdown can be eased; and ensuring doctors have discretion to use any therapeutics they consider useful (alongside, not instead of, clinical trials).

 

[two sheds]

Errrm when they trial corona vaccines do they give the vaccine and then actually infect them or let them wander round and see whether they get infected?

The former seems the only practical one but a bit fucking dodgy for the people in the trial

 

[editor]

Fucking landlord scum

Tenants who asked their billionaire landlord for a rent reduction during the coronavirus pandemic were told to use the money they would have spent on lunches and holidays to pay the full amount due.

More than 100 residents living in a block in Somerford Grove, east London, signed a letter addressed to their management estate agency and the building’s corporate landlords asking for a 20% reduction in rent and an agreement that no tenant would be evicted during the coronavirus pandemic.

But the letting agent, Tower Quay properties, told them their request was “unreasonable” and “unrealistic”, adding that any drop in tenants’ income would be minimised by a reduction in spending on holidays, entertainment, travel, clothes and lunches.

“Subsequently, when all of this is taken into account, in most cases we believe the impact on disposable income will be minimal, and there is therefore no justification for any reduction in rent, especially considering that whilst tenants are isolating the wear and tear in properties is increasing, which will be at the cost of the landlord,” the agent said.

Tenants told to use lunch and holiday savings to pay full rent

London agent for billionaire landlord turns down residents’ request for coronavirus relief

www.theguardian.com

 

[two sheds]

Fucking landlord scum

Tenants told to use lunch and holiday savings to pay full rent

London agent for billionaire landlord turns down residents’ request for coronavirus relief

www.theguardian.com

Christodoulou owns several properties and hotels across the UK and has appeared on the Sunday Times Rich List. There is no suggestion he was personally aware of the tenants’ request when it was initially made, or the agent’s response.

in which case they should have had his name in the headline to make him aware

 

[Azrael]

Errrm when they trial corona vaccines do they give the vaccine and then actually infect them or let them wander round and see whether they get infected?

The former seems the only practical one but a bit fucking dodgy for the people in the trial

Oxford team sounded like they'd rely on people picking it up in the wild, but a suppression strategy would make that unlikely.

Considering our government planned to infect 60-80% of the population without their consent, in the circumstances, deliberately infecting young, fit volunteers with a low dose on the basis of informed consent, no co-morbidities and their choice of treatments should they deteriorate may be something a team would consider. Wouldn't like to get that past an ethics committee, but even so.

 

[2hats]

Errrm when they trial corona vaccines do they give the vaccine and then actually infect them or let them wander round and see whether they get infected?

The former seems the only practical one but a bit fucking dodgy for the people in the trial

Vaccine trial design can be an ethical minefield.

For high risk pathogens you would look for appropriate immune system response - immunogenicity testing - rather than intentionally exposing them to live virus.

 

[Ms T]

Thanks Quimmy.

I don't even look at the tube - there's absolutely no way I'm getting on the tube at the moment though. Reckon that's probably the highest infection risk place anywhere in London.

I got the tube today. 3 people in my carriage at Brixton at 1030 and not even that when I got off at Oxford Circus. Central London was deserted. I did get a taxi home though because I wouldn’t have felt safe on the tube at 10pm, purely because it’s so empty.

 

[Azrael]

This is true 2hats , but given that the regulating bodies of the medical profession have, to date, done nothing to censure its leaders for flouting the Nuremberg Code and enlisting the entire population in a grotesque medical experiment without their consent, any processed concern about "ethics" for a tiny group of consenting volunteers must be the ultimate example of form over substance!

I of course hope it's unnecessary, but don't want to hear any empty concern from any regulator willing to wave through "herd immunity". If our supposed guardians of medical ethics gave a damn about safeguarding patients, they'd have been screaming blue murder a month ago.

 

[SheilaNaGig]

I think the problem is not that we don't have an end date as such, but we just have no other plan as an alternative to lockdown which would mean we could come out of it.

It's plainly obvious to everyone, that as soon as either the govt say we can ease lockdown, or everyone just gets bored of it anyway, we're just going to see the numbers go up again because there are absolutely no other measures now to try and stop/slow the spread, ie test and trace.

Well except for a vaccine, but I don't think people are going to be happy to wait around in lockdown for 18 months at least for something that may or may not happen.

And then we'll see a situation develop where the dead are seen to be a price worth paying so long as life can get back to normal, and a richer/poorer binary situation getting entrenched in which the rich can self isolate more easily than poor people (doorstep deliveries of everything, big comfortable cars, paying for tests, second homes, exclusive shops, decent PPE, private open spaces and gyms, gated communities, paid for security...)

Sorry. I guess this should go on the Endtimes thread rather than here.

 

[SheilaNaGig]

There's also a distinction between a tested, effective vaccine existing and it being available on the vast scale needed. International co-operation could also be a sticking point here.

Not to mention possible injurious effects of the vaccine itself. A quick gallop through safety testing could be a problem in the longer term.

Please note this is not an anti vaccination post. Adverse reactions can and do occur.

 

[SheilaNaGig]

Points taken

Is it the mass production aspect that would be the biggest part of the delay then?

littlebabyjesus was suggesting just above (#8847) that the pressure to scale up vaccine production ASAP would be pretty large.

I'm convinced I've also seen recent discussion on here concerning shorter timeframes for vaccine verification -- meaning a shorter timeframe just as a possibility.

I'll let those who've talked (informedly) along those lines add their bit if they want to -- I'm no scientist .

We haven't even got through the research and development stage yet. Trying to develop an effective vaccine will just take as long as it takes. Throwing money at that bit of the problem won't help it go very much faster. They can be working on manufacture and distribution and setting up testing etc in advance, having all that ready to go at a moments notice. But the R&D bit can't be skimped or rushed.


ETA
Although, hopefully, some of the work done so far might yield good results.

 

[SheilaNaGig]

Exactly my position. Since so much of the failure to develop a (human) coronavirus vaccine to date rests on lack of will and resources, I'm cautiously optimistic that one will be available a lot sooner than the 18 months mantra.

But it can't be relied on, and its absence mustn't become an excuse for inactivity. Not only do we have the tools to fight SARS-CoV-2 without a vaccine, they successfully eliminated its predecessor from the face of the earth. Wish advocates of test/trace/isolate in the media made a lot more of this. Yes, it was a different disease, but you must fight your corner with all you have.

Thankfully it appears that New Zealand and now Australia's successes are having a real impact here, with the Mail claiming that Johnson, terrified by his ICU experience, wants to get Britain close to where Australia is. We'll see.

This is the thing. We DO have the tools and weapons to get ahead of the virus. We are equipped. But some countries just don't seem to have the determination or the basic wit to do the necessaries.

 

[SheilaNaGig]

Vaccine trial design can be an ethical minefield.

For high risk pathogens you would look for appropriate immune system response - immunogenicity testing - rather than intentionally exposing them to live virus.

So it doesn't get tested with a real vector til it's used in the population?

 

[2hats]

So it doesn't get tested with a real vector til it's used in the population?

A latter stage of a trial programme might involve various groups of volunteers from the community during an outbreak. Precise details up to the ethics committee.

Consider ebola. A vaccine candidate was offered on a voluntary basis to people in the area of an outbreak (ring vaccination strategy) - an efficacy trial justified under compassionate use. Subjects weren't intentionally exposed to ebola. Monitoring of the outbreak and serological testing determined how effective it was. It did appear to work but the findings are still challenged by some in the field (it has since been used in large scale vaccination trials and has subsequently received approval from regulatory agencies).

 

[2hats]

(awaits their working)

 

[SheilaNaGig]

A latter stage of a trial programme might involve various groups of volunteers from the community during an outbreak. Precise details up to the ethics committee.

Consider ebola. A vaccine candidate was offered on a voluntary basis to people in the area of an outbreak (ring vaccination strategy) - an efficacy trial justified under compassionate use. Subjects weren't intentionally exposed to ebola. Monitoring of the outbreak and serological testing determined how effective it was . It did appear to work but the findings are still challenged by some in the field (it has since been used in large scale vaccination trials and has subsequently received approval from regulatory agencies).

So even if the preliminary findings look promising we’ll have to wait to find out if a vaccine actually works in practice...?

And there will be various different vaccines all beings rolled out by different teams?

 

[2hats]

So even if the preliminary findings look promising we’ll have to wait to find out if a vaccine actually works in practice...?

And there will be various different vaccines all beings rolled out by different teams?

Research takes time. Thorough research takes longer.

There are at least 18 vaccine frontrunners right now, of which 4 or 5 have been approved for human trials at this time. Maybe half have started some sort of trial. The rest are hoping to start conducting trials in the second half of this year.

Track COVID-19 Vaccines Advancing Through Clinical Trials

Find the latest updates in this one-stop resource, including efficacy data and side effects of approved shots, as well as progress on new candidates entering human studies.

www.the-scientist.com

 

[weltweit]

Or, it could be that there's nothing wrong with testing, but the results are mundane. As far as I understand (more than happy to be corrected), the presence of antibodies is something that develops over time post-infection, so variance between participants may not be so alarming. The article suggests that some people had levels below what was expected, but this is early research, so what would the yardstick be?

I was meaning antigen tests not being 100% reliable. A false negative during recovery could persuade people that they had recovered, (only thing is I gather in many settings they want two negatives to establish recovery) when in fact perhaps they hadn't yet done so.