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Possible serious side effects from the Astra Zeneca vaccine discussion

Supine said:
I don’t know about toxic. Some of us are trying to highlight relative risk and to put some perspective on it. HCP or not people need to make informed decisions and not taking it due to misguided ideas will kill people.
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As mentioned, the article on the recent research posted by felixthecat is a very good read, and a clear presentation of the evidence. On that evidence, it isn't misguided as a healthy under-30 person, or even an under-50 person, to think twice about taking AZ, especially when you factor in other knowledge, for instance, if the person knows they have had covid and so already have some protection.

It gives me no pleasure to say this. I am very pro-vaccine, and I want us to keep jabbing if at all possible. If this were the only vaccine available, on balance I'd say 'keep going, the reward of community protection outweighs the risks to the individual'. But it isn't. Not taking AZ doesn't mean not taking the vaccine, it just maybe means a delay for a month or two. And in this particular moment in this country, with the most vulnerable already jabbed and infection levels low and falling, there isn't a mad urgency.
 
From the Guardian article I linked earlier

“The important thing now is that they know how to diagnose it and they know how to treat it. People under the age of 30, at low risk from Covid itself, can choose to have an alternative vaccine. But nobody should say do not get vaccinated, said Scully.

“That is one message we cannot put across because it’s absolutely critical for public health,” she said.”
 
Just got contacted to go for vaccination a bit earlier than expected. I thought I'd be over the moon when it happened but this stuff has made me a bit subdued about it, knowing I'll probably get AZ. I do know someone who has Guillan-Barre syndrome from it too (or that's how doctors have interpreted how he got it).
 
You know....the 4 in a million cases of the severe clotting and platelets issue doesn't address the other clotting issues linked with AZ or the inflammatory conditions or myocarditis or atrial fibrillation etc....

So when a perfectly healthy person's life is altered dramatically and permanently there's not much point telling them "tough luck... the rest of the world is saved".

Thats not how vaccine trials and medicines are normally controlled or rolled out. And obviously there is an abundance of care being taken in many countries now as regards how AZ is administered to selected groups. This is because of vaccine reaction.

I wonder if AZ would have made it as a vaccine in a non pandemic emergency scenario? Having said that ... I can understand how the whole "it is better than nothing" attitude can develop when it comes to preventing a pandemic.
What is interesting is the fact that other vaccines are available with arguably fewer severe problems and people are still defending AZ like it's a personal quest to prove it's all fine...and people are over reacting. I don't think that's fair when it's clear that the concern is coming from medical and scientific quarters.
 
It's a fucker cos AZ is the cheapest one and the easiest to store, and was earmarked for the Covax programme. tbh the UK is the least of the worries wrt AZ now. We've already done all the vulnerable groups, so we're now into the building community resistance stage. The implications of these problems for the rest of the world are far worse.
 
Supine said:
No, it’s perfectly natural to have concerns. Deciding to go against regulatory advice though is a problem IMO.
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I am uncomfortable with the idea of people blindly following regulatory advice, as you said in a pervious post 'people need to make informed decisions', which to me goes beyond just doing what are are told to do.

I was following the news very closely before my jab on 20th March, and it was clear to me that there was probably a link between the AZ vaccine & these unusual events, which is now confirmed, but on the balance of benefit-to-risk at my age, I decided it was worth it to me, if however I was 15-20 years younger I may well have come to a different conclusion.
 
cupid_stunt said:
I am uncomfortable with the idea of people blindly following regulatory advice, as you said in a pervious post 'people need to make informed decisions', which to me goes beyond just doing what are are told to do.

I was following the news very closely before my jab on 20th March, and it was clear to me that there was probably a link between the AZ vaccine & these unusual events, which is now confirmed, but on the balance of benefit-to-risk at my age, I decided it was worth it to me, if however I was 15-20 years younger I may well have come to a different conclusion.
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Very similar for me. And I think it's also totally rational and reasonable as a younger person to decide that the risk is very small (which it is) and that you still want to get it and take that small risk for the sake of herd immunity. I think I'd probably have made that choice if I were a bit younger. I really wanted the jab ASAP! But it's totally reasonable, and not irrational, to reach a different conclusion.

What's important, imo, is that people should know beforehand whether what they're doing has a clear personal benefit to them or is something they're deciding to do primarily for the sake of others.
 
littlebabyjesus said:
And the examples given above are concentrated on risk to the individual - a woman taking the birth control pill isn't protecting others by doing so. The examples mix and match and give a frankly plain wrong statement about covid infection.
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Also not all blood clots are equivalent. In just over half of the cases in the two studies, the patient died. What percentage of the blood clots caused by birth control are fatal?
 
IC3D said:
The attitude to AZ vaccine hesitancy here is almost toxic, I'm sorry for the poster being talked down too about their experiences. People could just stfu once in a while.
I know plenty of experienced HCPs not jumping to have it.
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I agree, there are numerous examples of people trying to shutdown certain angles of discussion in a manner that mirrors the wider attempts to paint a narrow and reassuring picture in public that authorities and some members of industry and society are well versed in. It comes naturally to them. Me getting annoyed with this shit when I see it comes naturally to me. Its got plenty in common with some of the reassuring bullshit in the opening months of this pandemic. Shit that a large chunk of my output was designed to counter.

Thanks for speaking up about this. I've always found the posts you've shared about the far messier, less convenient picture that some professionals and people on the front lines have had at various stages of this pandemic to be incredibly useful.
 
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Supine said:
No, it’s perfectly natural to have concerns. Deciding to go against regulatory advice though is a problem IMO.
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Other countries have differing advice and also I found it unusual that the dose timings can be moved around.
I suspect the dose is too high hence the positive results with the half dose in trial and full on side effects .
 
Sugar Kane said:
So when a perfectly healthy person's life is altered dramatically and permanently there's not much point telling them "tough luck... the rest of the world is saved".
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Totally agree.

I wonder if AZ would have made it as a vaccine in a non pandemic emergency scenario?
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Probably yes, because just like the other vaccines approved in the EU, UK & US, it went through all the usual clinical trails, and I remember reading the numbers on the trails were far higher with covid vaccines than is usual, because there was so many volunteers, and the need for speed.

We know from past experience that sadly once a drug or vaccine passes clinical trails, and gains approval, sometimes things get picked up once they become more wildly used in the general population, that result in restrictions on their use or even withdrawal.

And, sadly, it looks like there could now be a problem with the Johnson & Johnson/Janssen vaccine too, which wasn't picked up in their clinical trails.
 
IC3D said:
Other countries have differing advice and also I found it unusual that the dose timings can be moved around.
I suspect the dose is too high hence the positive results with the half dose in trial and full on side effects .
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tbf a few other countries are now following the UK's lead on dose timings (Canada and Germany have lengthened their gaps). That does appear to be something the UK has got right.

On balance, I'm glad the UK has pushed ahead as it has done, but I also recognise, as Sugar Kane rightly points out, that the benefits from that decision are of no consolation whatever to the families of the 19 people who have died.
 
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littlebabyjesus said:
tbf a few other countries are now following the UK's lead on dose timings (Canada and Germany have lengthened their gaps). That does appear to be something the UK has got right.
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Lucked into it, which I wont complain about too much because I was just happy that such good fortune was part of the outcome on that one.

Although what I havent found time to do is to check whether, in addition to changing the dose timing to meet a practical objective in terms of total number of people given their first dose by a certain date, there was an existing theoretical basis to anticipate that an increase in gap between doses might increase protective effects. Its in my 'could be' list but like I said Ive not found time to go hunting for background knowledge on that issue.
 
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littlebabyjesus said:
As mentioned, the article on the recent research posted by felixthecat is a very good read, and a clear presentation of the evidence. On that evidence, it isn't misguided as a healthy under-30 person, or even an under-50 person, to think twice about taking AZ, especially when you factor in other knowledge, for instance, if the person knows they have had covid and so already have some protection.

It gives me no pleasure to say this. I am very pro-vaccine, and I want us to keep jabbing if at all possible. If this were the only vaccine available, on balance I'd say 'keep going, the reward of community protection outweighs the risks to the individual'. But it isn't. Not taking AZ doesn't mean not taking the vaccine, it just maybe means a delay for a month or two. And in this particular moment in this country, with the most vulnerable already jabbed and infection levels low and falling, there isn't a mad urgency.
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Its probably already quite clear that my mind wanders in that direction, especially as Im lucky enough that I can do my own personal lockdown for a long time yet without many negative personal consequences.

Whilst mulling this stuff over I do need to check for weakensses to this approach. The lack of obvious 'mad urgency' is a potential weakness because there is the usual pandemic complications in regards exponential growth, tipping points and the way that some aspects can seem small and insignificant until they suddenly arent. So not so much a question of whether there is obvious mad urgency today, but whether it is possible to activate that sense of urgency in good time, waiting till the urgency is undeniable has tended to be a recipe for disaster. And from the governments point of view, given their unlocking timetable and the modelling of that which has been done, the sense of urgency to carry on mass vaccination in younger groups is not going to go away for them until the mission is far more complete than it is today.
 
elbows said:
Its probably already quite clear that my mind wanders in that direction, especially as Im lucky enough that I can do my own personal lockdown for a long time yet without many negative personal consequences.

Whilst mulling this stuff over I do need to check for weakensses to this approach. The lack of obvious 'mad urgency' is a potential weakness though because there is the usual pandemic complications in regards exponential growth, tipping points and the way that some aspects can seem small and insignificant until they suddenly arent. So not so much a question of whether there is obvious mad urgency today, but whether it is possible to activate that sense of urgency in good time, waiting till the urgency is undeniable has tended to be a recipe for disaster. And from the governments point of view, given their unlocking timetable and the modelling of that which has been done, the sense of urgency to carry on mass vaccination in younger groups is not going to go away for them until the mission is far more complete than it is today.
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It's a fair point. You only know there's a surge after it's well under way. That's why I'm also in favour on balance of the mass testing programme.

I remain optimistic, though. We and certain other places like Portugal have already had the wave that is currently hitting places like Turkey. It will probably take a new mutation to cause another major outbreak here. And of course that could well happen, but it's not a certainty.
 
littlebabyjesus said:
As mentioned, the article on the recent research posted by felixthecat is a very good read, and a clear presentation of the evidence. On that evidence, it isn't misguided as a healthy under-30 person, or even an under-50 person, to think twice about taking AZ, especially when you factor in other knowledge, for instance, if the person knows they have had covid and so already have some protection.

It gives me no pleasure to say this. I am very pro-vaccine, and I want us to keep jabbing if at all possible. If this were the only vaccine available, on balance I'd say 'keep going, the reward of community protection outweighs the risks to the individual'. But it isn't. Not taking AZ doesn't mean not taking the vaccine, it just maybe means a delay for a month or two. And in this particular moment in this country, with the most vulnerable already jabbed and infection levels low and falling, there isn't a mad urgency.
Click to expand...
This post gives me some comfort, in that it confirms that i've not suddenly turned into an irrational hypocrite - I'm a mid 40s woman with a recent positive antibody test and i've not yet clicked to book my 1st jab, though it has been available to do since yesterday.
But also, I hadn't thought about the (obvious) fact that the people in this country who would have been most at risk - from a hesitant me - have already been vaccinated. So as you say, that does seem to reduce the urgency somewhat, I'm just thinking to hover over that booking button for another couple of weeks maybe see what changes. Feels pretty uncomfortable though, like i'm being silly, or selfish.
 
bimble said:
This post gives me some comfort, in that it confirms that i've not suddenly turned into an irrational hypocrite - I'm a mid 40s woman with a recent positive antibody test and i've not yet clicked to book my 1st jab, though it has been available to do since yesterday.
But also, I hadn't thought about the (obvious) fact that the people in this country who would have been most at risk - from a hesitant me - have already been vaccinated. So as you say, that does seem to reduce the urgency somewhat, I'm just thinking to hover over that booking button for another couple of weeks maybe see what changes. Feels pretty uncomfortable though, like i'm being silly, or selfish.
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imo, and only imo, I don't think this is a decision I would try to force on someone at the moment. There are still good arguments that you should go ahead and get it, both for the sake of herd immunity and just for the sake of having had it. Despite not being high risk personally (and strongly suspecting that I had covid last year), I'm glad I'm now vaccinated. it is a nice thing to have had done in this current world.

What your friend told you about the relative risk compared to smoking is correct. But the worries aren't irrational.
 
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