Some Possible Good News on the Vaccine

I will not post about the ridiculous coup. I will not post about the ridiculous coup. I will not post about the ridiculous coup.

Instead, here's some COVID-hope from Andy Slavitt after he talked to multiple world-class scientists about today's non-peer-reviewed vaccine announcement from Pfizer (full version here):

First off: until today they didn’t really know whether a vaccine would work. They knew they could help you create antibodies, but not that those antibodies would prevent disease. They all feel we crossed that important bridge today.

“Zero reason to doubt it”
“Best day of the pandemic so far”
“We thought flu vaccine. This is way way better”
“On a scale of 1 to 10, this is a 12.”
“We are finally playing offense.”

Part of what’s so encouraging is that they now feel the virus and the spike protein are a pretty easy mark. That the virus is lethal because it’s novel, not because it’s complicated. All felt this meant the other candidates — Moderna, AZ, J&J and others are much more likely to succeed. Good. We will need them all.

We know it works on people up to 85. Don’t know about kids, don’t know about pregnant women.

Other things we don’t know.

• How long does the immunity last?
• Does it work on severe and mild or just mild cases?
• Are you still contagious if you are vaccinated?
• Does it work after the fact as an innoculation? The supposition is that there were at least some severe cases protected.

There are 50 million doses produced by the end of the year. 2 doses per person. 25 million people. US purchased many vaccines, but didn’t fund through [the Trump Administration program called] Warp Speed. So sorry Mike Pence said that. It doesn’t make it true.

Side effect profile? Seems like normal stuff. Mild stuff. But there is more road left here to complete the study. So let’s watch it.

1.2 billion [doses] ready for next year. Plus other [companies' vaccine] candidates mean next year will roll out likely from frontline workers to seniors to at-risk people.

Instead of test-trace-isolate. Test-trace-isolate-vaccinate. With high compliance you would wipe out the bug rapidly. Implications:

1. This is the light at the end of the tunnel we’ve been looking for. If you’re fatigued you now have reason for hope. To make it through safely.
2. Be safe this winter. You can have next winter...
5. If the numbers are right, we need 60% compliance instead of the 80-90% we thought to get to herd immunity.

Well then. I hope all of that bears out as true!

Meanwhile, Minnesota is in really, really bad shape. We've vaulted past Wisconsin, our hospitals are full, and we have the fourth highest absolute number of daily cases in the country. The only states with a higher number (Illinois, Florida, and Texas) all have much higher populations.