Tag Archives: vaccine

January 17, 2022 · 18:32

Principle of a chair

Yes, we get that. We sometimes we rely on the principle of a chair until we figure things out, we sit on the problem. We aren’t hiding it, we aren’t ignoring it yet at times we aren’t sure where we are in such a situation. We contemplate and I am no different. So when I saw (at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-59970281) the article ‘Is the pandemic entering its endgame?’ I was not sure how to feel about that. So when I saw ““We’re almost there, it is now the beginning of the end, at least in the UK,” Prof Julian Hiscox, chairman in infection and global health at the University of Liverpool, tells me. “I think life in 2022 will be almost back to before the pandemic.”” I was not sure how to feel, was the man openly optimistic? There is optimism and there is folly. Until November 2021 there was no Omicron, there was no enhanced danger to the global health systems. Now we see that we are seeing less cases, but it is still almost 2 million new cases a day. And that is whilst we openly see that the numbers from India do not make sense. A setting where the US has a health system that is near collapsing and the UK is in no better state. Then there is the one thought we all ignore, what comes next? Omicron slapped us across the face and when is there a next version? Is this Prof Julian Hiscox trying to sell us genuine pink salmon? (A Barnum and Bailey joke). Yet we also get the good stuff here, because we are told “What’s changing is our immunity. The new coronavirus first emerged two years ago in Wuhan, China, and we were vulnerable. It was a completely new virus that our immune systems had not experienced before and we had no drugs or vaccines to help.” I agree with that part, I agree that the vaccines are the solution, yet the evolution of Covid is still largely unknown, or at least we are not being told. So a next version could spell a lot of havoc in many lives. And that fear is confirmed with “The only major curve ball would be a new variant that can outcompete Omicron and cause significantly more severe disease”, as such the article makes a lot of sense and I cannot disagree, but at what stage do we ignore what might come? When do we accept the endemic path? People are all about to get back to the job and income, but the danger with endemic and a new version in that endemic universe means more death and even as I applaud that (we are as overpopulated as we need to be), will you feel the same when it is your children or your parents whose lives are on the line? We see the line that less die but this time around we have a new setting, the lack of hospital beds could also fuel deaths and Omicron made that clear in the US and the UK. Even if we see causality in these cases, we cannot continue on a path where people die because all the beds are taken by Covid cases. That was why I supported the stage where unvaccinated cases are not allowed hospital beds, and if required only through fully paid services (upfront), if you feel it is unfair, too bad. It is shown several times over that vaccinated people can get seriously sick, but shorter and for the most not fatally. So whenever I see another hack piece where someone claims that the unvaccinated take only 50% of the beds, I kinda go ‘Yes, and the pope is Jewish!’ There is a clear station where vaccines are the solution, yes there are a few dangerous side effects possible, but that danger is nowhere near the station of the unvaccinated dying of covid. So how do we react to anti vaccine people like Kelly Ernby, Marcus Lamb, Glynn Steel, William Hartmann? We need not react, covid killed them all and a lot more like them. My only issue is that they talked others in refusing the vaccine, optionally killing them all. 

Some say we need to to make fun of them. I am on the fence on that. On one side it might make those who listened to these anti-vaxxers wake up and get vaccinated, on the other hand their graves should be a clear message and in all this misinformation continues on nearly all fronts. The only issue is that even doctors are spreading misinformation. Not many, but those who do are fuelling into vaccination feelings under the average person and that is a dangerous stage. You see, the stage of an endemic is fine as long as we are ALL vaccinated, when that is not the case we will see more mutations and more deaths and that is the larger stage, the next mutation might be a lot more deadly than Omicron was. In Omicron it was about spreading the disease, but if that evolves into a more deadly version the game changes by a lot and to stop that danger we all need to be vaccinated, there is no other option. This is a stage we face, we either act in fear (for kids, siblings, parents), we act in denial, we act in support or in acceptance. I get it, they are all stages that propel us, but that is equally wrong, as is sitting on the problem, but at times when there are too many unknown elements it feels like the best solution. I got vaccinated in the early days, I am a product of vaccines (60’s) I lived through the eradication of Polio, difteria, TBC, measles and so on. Some of these diseases still exist, but they are now so rare that we act in surprise when a case does show up. At some point this will be the case for covid as well, but not now, there are still too many dangers and to some degree the anti-vaxxers are making it happen. It is my personal believe that a mutation can only come from an unvaccinated person. I know, it might be completely wrong, but that is how I feel and the medical people still do not know what drove covid, what brought mutations and why Omicron was regarded as ‘mild’ when we knew so little. Too many questions and we see no answers that is in part the problem because it fuels the feelings of anti-vaxxers. 

The principle of a chair is at times not the wrong position to have when enough information comes towards us, yet that too has not been the case with covid and w get it, there are a lot of unknown elements and scientists do need the time to study and prove parts. But this is a setting that has gone on for well over a year and the people are burning out on all sides and their less accepting side is becoming visible more and more, especially now.

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May 4, 2021 · 21:57

The Kipling manouver

Yes, it is about India, and at this moment a certain counter is at 39,887. So whilst I am telling you this story, based on all kinds of data, I will be preparing the next setting and let havoc rule. The Indian stage is set to Rudyard Kipling, in this that I look at Mine Own People, is that not the Indian station they face? Whilst the BBC gives us ‘India passes 20 million cases amid oxygen shortage’, we will be confronted with all kinds of data and we do get part of the goods with “testing numbers have dipped as well, sparking fears that India’s true caseload is far higher. Case numbers, however, have been consistently falling in Maharashtra state, which had driven the second wave since early April”, I personally believe that the second wave is getting too much credit and the first wave was ignored to a too large a degree. As we see here ‘fears that India’s true caseload is far higher’, I believe that to be a much larger truth. Even as we are given “fuelled by lax safety protocols and massive public festivals and election rallies, has also overwhelmed its hospitals” we only see a partial truth. The image that world-o-meter gives us might spark your view.

There is no real data proving my thoughts, but I find the data from January 1st to March 31st debatable. I added pictures of Indian market places from last October and other images as well are not encouraging. There is in my mind no acceptable version that this data is correct, I believe and accept that the second wave is more contagious, but the curve we see here does not match any acceptable infection curve. The weird part is that the media blatantly accepts whatever is handed to them and why is that? 

Could I be wrong?
Yes, off course I can be wrong, I am also debating whether I am right, but consider the curve we see, consider the images we saw, consider the numbers that some gave us, they do not add up. Whilst we saw the numbers in Germany, Spain, UK and US, no one is questioning them from a place with 1.3 billion people. No one is wondering how these numbers whilst there is no lockdown stayed in check. Well, if you do not measure, if you have no data, you basically have nothing to report. We now see “But experts say India’s Covid death toll is vastly under-reported as official tallies don’t appear to match what people are witnessing on the ground”, a setting I expected already 6 months ago and now governments are all ‘rising’ to the underreported occasion. So as we get “Many states have introduced restrictions, from full lockdowns to night curfews. The northern state of Bihar, which has been adding about 13,000 daily cases in recent days, is the latest to announce a full lockdown”, is anyone noticing ‘introduced restrictions’? A setting the rest of the world pushed towards a year ago, on the other hand, those American idiots that are all making ‘anti-lockdown’ complaint, they can look at India and die the same way. They can look at the death numbers and see what is possible in the US, on the positive side, if the US gets another 200K fatalities there would be less unemployment, the US would have a better fitting budget and the people might overall end up being a lot more clever, not good news for the Republicans, but there is always one party crying, that is the way to donut rolls.

Why being blunt?
That is easy to answer, we tried diplomacy and euphemisms for way too long and the world I running out of time, nature would love it if the population declines at least another 23%, but they might not get that part either. In all this we might take notice of “it’s also true that daily cases have fallen, on average, in Delhi, Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra, all hotspot states”, yet I wonder how those numbers could be trusted. Even as SBS reported with ‘Calls for nationwide lockdown as India surpasses 20 million COVID-19 cases’, we need to wonder why a national lockdown has not been in place for a long time. And even as the media is making ‘grim’ callings, now, we see that there are 20,000,000 infections and it might seem lower than the US, yet with a population 500% of the US and only 50% of the infections that the US has, the numbers do not add up, especially when you consider that (regardless of those opposing lockdowns) the US at least had some and had some social distancing demands, a side that India is pretty much unable to do, the population pressure is that high. 

The quote “The other issue, experts say, is insufficient testing. While Uttar Pradesh, one of the worst-affected states, has recorded no drop in testing figures, it’s testing far less than other states” is pretty much on the nose, the ‘insufficient testing’ is an issue for pretty much all India and that was pretty visible 6 months ago, so why is everyone pussyfooting around India? 

People all screaming the need for responsibility and no one seems to be taking it. And even as we are told that shortages will last for months, without a proper lockdown scenario the numbers will continue to rise and even when it slows down the numbers will continue for a long time to come. As I see it, no matter how it turns, until India receives well over 2.5 billion doses of a vaccine, there is every chance that Covid-19 will be present in India when we are well into 2023, a setting the Indian government will loudly deny and when that evidence comes out in 2023, one person takes the blame, falls onto their sword and the Indian government will make new arrangements. 

What a nice speculated prediction, isn’t it?

Have a great day.

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January 30, 2021 · 21:26

When is a contract not one?

Yes, I have been bitching over the last few days in regard to the sales contract that the EU was crying about, and we all understand that at times things are a bit more complex than we think it is. We all get that (me too), yet what happens when we start comparing notes?

So the larger stage started yesterday with ‘The lever for the nipple for the trigger’, the story gave us a larger situation, a situation most of the media was shallow about, so as we went from the Reuters story (at https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-vaccines-needles/analysis-russian-roulette-in-europe-as-needle-shortages-hamper-covid-19-shots-idUSKBN29Y10C) we ended up at the BBC where we see ‘EU-AstraZeneca disputed vaccine contract made public’. That story (at https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-55852698), well actually it does not, it makes matters worse. It starts with “Transparency and accountability are important to help build the trust of European citizens and to make sure that they can rely on the effectiveness and safety of the vaccines purchased at the EU level”, just after we were given “pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca has agreed to publish the redacted contract”, yes in the EU transparency and redaction go hand in hand, in some places it is known as filtered content (see the media).

Vaccines__contract_between_European_Commission_and_AstraZeneca_now_publishedDownload

So when we have a look at the file above, we see “Through the contract, all Member States are able to purchase 300 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine, with an option for a further 100 million doses”, I do not see this as a contract, it is an excuse and a poor one at that. In this, consider what you see here and then consider the Reuters quote that I used yesterday “So when we see ““accordance with locally approved labelling,” Pfizer said after the EU drugs regulator’s decision to shift to a six-dose label”, yet the question in my mind was “who, what, when, where, how and why was the setting of the change to a 6 dose label?”” I see this as the EU orders doses, after which an EU regulator allows the SAME VIAL to be used for 6 doses and then there is suddenly a syringe shortage, is anyone in the stage where the EU people are getting shafted by some EU regulators who seem to require their heads to be screwed on right?

Yet the EU get charged for the vial, regardless whether this gives the health care worker, 5 or 6 shots. An optional 16% wasted right off the bat. For a transparent organisation they are way too incompetent, in addition, I wonder if we see who pays for the new syringes, I am certain it will not be AstraZeneca, or darn, the article gives us that too. It gives us “BioNTech says it has procured 50 million needles that it can sell at cost to countries around the world, and is seeking to buy more”, so whilst a lot will be staring at the ‘at cost’, we seemingly forget that it was an extra expense, one that was not needed if the idiot EU regulator, would not have allowed for the label change from 5 doses to 6 doses on that same vial, my soft request is that this EU regulator is to get a dishonourable discharge dated to the day he allowed for that stupidity. At cost or not, BioNTech is making a killing on needles at present, because we might think it is at cost, it will come with a great tax option for them, and it is not that the EU do not need taxpayers, do they?

So whilst some are facing the call of coordination, we are (read: need to be) considering the impact of “In Germany, vaccine distribution is handled by the central government but its 16 federal states are responsible for obtaining the needles and syringes needed to inject them – with mixed results”, and that is merely one nation, set this to factor 26 and you see part of the mess the EU faces and in all this, how far will 50,000,000 needles get them and the rest, is that at cost as well or is that the surprise of the week? Are you still wondering why that EU regulator needs to be fired without benefits? I think the people in the EU have had enough of the gravy train, as this is going to cost lives, the people will catch on and demand the rolling of heads in the EU commissions, are you with me on this one?

Should you doubt me  consider the final quote “Saxony, on the Czech border, is also having to shop around as scarce supply forces up prices, said Lars Werthmann, regional head of vaccine logistics at the German Red Cross”, consider the earlier statement ‘at cost’ and now we see ‘scarce supply forces up prices’, so are the 50 million syringes used already? The EU is a fill your pockets organisation and that is also why I wanted the UK to leave the EU, the EU will not police itself or allow any policing of the gravy train and that is why I am happy that the UK left, the EU will learn that the cost of non-policing will come at a cost, I merely wonder if they can afford it, I think no, but in that I could be wrong.

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January 30, 2021 · 00:17

The lever for the nipple for the trigger

It is a setting that made me giggle, I had not heard this for decades, I reckon the last time I heard it was in the 70’s, the full phrase was “the lever for the nipple for the trigger that sets the button is out of stock”, a stage that we see in a complex environment where all the eyes are fixated on the engine, and everyone forgot about the control panel that activates the engine. That was the sentiment when I was confronted with ‘“Russian roulette” in Europe as needle shortages hamper COVID-19 shots’. The article (at https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-vaccines-needles/analysis-russian-roulette-in-europe-as-needle-shortages-hamper-covid-19-shots-idUSKBN29Y10C) gives us “Laurent Fignon, a geriatric doctor in the south of France, is having to improvise as he gives shots of the COVID-19 vaccine from Pfizer and BioNTech to care home residents and health staff because supplies of the right needles and syringes are short”, a stage where everyone sees the need of the vaccine and there is seemingly a national stage (all over Europe) a stage Reuters warned us about a week earlier with ‘EU scrambles for syringes to avoid wasting Pfizer vaccines and extra cost’ yet a lot of people have not caught on, as people scrambled to get their share of 3,000,000,000 vials. Exactly by whom and where do we see the order of a similar amount of syringes?
So when we see ““accordance with locally approved labelling,” Pfizer said after the EU drugs regulator’s decision to shift to a six-dose label”, yet the question in my mind was “who, what, when, where, how and why was the setting of the change to a 6 dose label?” An important setting as we are faced with an seemingly speculated option that the people got shafted for 16% of all vaccines, especially when we consider the quote “It was initially sold in the EU in vials meant to deliver five doses, but a global shortage of shots and a viability assessment on dosage convinced the EU drugs regulator to approve on Jan. 8 the extraction of six doses from the same vials”, so which yahoo was the ‘EU drugs regulator’ approving this part? That person might have valid reasoning, but when I look back at the times when a 60 people life-raft held 61 people, that one person to stay alive basically condemned the other 60 to death, but the people tend to overlook that part too easily. And as we get to “The decision increased availability, prompting Pfizer to raise its output targets for this year to 2 billion vaccines from 1.3 billion initially envisaged”, so who is looking into the 16% shift to account towards the 60% shortage of doses, or is the 16% step a way to hide the fact that matters were much worse? I am merely asking, because either way shows that I have been right since mid 2020, and is it not interesting that it took the media this long to catch on (which is not their fault in this case, mind you)? 

So when we see everyone shout for vaccines and we are confronted with “Similar shortages are cropping up elsewhere in Europe, complicating a stuttering start to vaccination efforts”, we need to take a look at their syringe orders as well. So when we see “Pfizer now forecasts it will produce 2 billion doses this year, but this assumes it will be possible to extract the full six from each vial. It charges by the dose, meaning the cost of a vial has gone up 20%” we now get to the question “was the vial created to set 6 doses? As such was it bigger, if not, and we give the people merely 96% of the dose, does it still work properly? More important, when you realise that getting 100% out of a vial is almost impossible, just like the 61st passenger on a lifeboat, how many will be endangered by this? Should the danger be 0% (which is always possible) then why are several EU members making such a ruckus on this? Is it to hide the possibility that they forgot to order the syringes?

And as Reuters gives us “The European Commission is pressing Pfizer and German partner BioNTech to deliver more of the low-dead-space needles to extract the extra dose” we get to the heart of the matter. A mere approach to flim-flam the numbers and how many needles were ordered and more important when were they ordered? Yet in all this, looking at numerous sources, we see a lack of explanation where we get ‘meaning the cost of a vial has gone up 20%’, is that merely the needle? I don’t think so, the numbers are debatable and no one is looking, nw I will be the first to admit that this is not my field of expertise, and optionally it was a Reuters interpretation of the facts (which is optionally not wrong), and it could have been handed to Reuters in this way, but the lack of questions on all this is staggering. 

You see, the first in a whole range of questions is seen with “For buyers of the vaccine, however, there was a drawback because EU states face the prospect of paying the price of six doses for each vial, regardless of their ability to extract a sixth shot”, from my point of view I would grasp back to the original sales contract in three cases already the stage was set to emotion, all whilst we are facing the raw sales deal and EU politicians seem to rely on emotion rather than the contract that was drawn up, I wonder why.

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October 26, 2020 · 22:06

The end of denial

It is true, we all face it and when we do it is not always a pretty moment. I am no exception to this. It happens at some point of revelation or the consideration that I finally figure out a factor that others and I myself too had not considered. Before that it all made sense, yet after that moment and after we banged our own heads to a desk, the wall (a hardened surface) we get the thoughts “How could I have been this dim”, “WTF was I thinking” or the more popular “I have to start from scratch”, the last one is important in this. You see, most think that a mere course correction can fix this, and for the most that would be correct, yet there is the part we all ignore to take “If I forgot one element, what are the chances I forgot two?” You think it is that easy, but it is not. You see the first forgotten part could easily hide the second part and realising that is important. That is the stage that is illuminated by ‘The worst is yet to come’ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2020/09/06/the-worst-is-yet-to-come/), even as I did not mention it there, the stage of escalations and even as I tipped on the stage with “other numbers give us “4,114,773”, the number is 50% off and that is merely the beginning. India might be the most visible one, but there is no way that they are the only one. There is yet more, it cannot be given full credibility”, it is a stage we go through and the confirmation became more visible as the day to day known infections raced towards 400K cases a day and on October 23 it stopped at 490K cases a day. I also observed “I believe there is a whole range of those with the Coronavirus and those who died of it are not counted for whatever reason. There is no blame here, the US and other nations had not been confronted with this situation for 100 years. The stage was never ready for this and with the bulk of all nations in a budget crunch it will not be resolved”, which is a larger truth in all this. And today the BBC gives us ‘Trump’s chief of staff admits US cannot control pandemic’, whether this is a ‘come clean moment’ or an ‘end denial moment’ doesn’t really matter, it is too late for some stage of ‘setting a solution’. Yet there we also see the next stage of denial. When we see “White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows said Covid-19 could only be defeated by “mitigation areas” like vaccines and therapeutics”, this sounds nice in theory, yet there is no vaccine, anyone making a claim to the otherwise is lying to you. The Australian ABC now gives us, 12 hours ago ‘Why is the Government now saying it could take up to 12 months to roll out a coronavirus vaccine in Australia?’ The answer is simple, there is no vaccine, you can plan and make ideas for rolling out a vaccine in early 2021, but if there is no vaccine, it is merely a spreadsheet with dates. And that is the realisation that everyone wants you to forget. ABC acknowledges this with “depending on which candidate is ultimately successful” because the party giving us the vaccine is still unknown, they are all fighting to be the best, merely because the reward (money) is too appealing. So what on earth is making industry Minister Karen Andrews say “medical company CSL and CSIRO are equipped to quickly manufacture a “protein-based” vaccine — like the type being developed by the University of Queensland”, quickly manufacture what? There is no vaccine and the quicker we realise this the better we are off. Optionally 4% of the world population WILL die, that gives us that funeral directors will need access to up to 320 million caskets. OK, that was wrong and an exaggeration, plenty will opt for cremation. And my setting is only correct for as long as the 4% mortality rate holds up, when that escalates the numbers will really go up, having your money stuck in Wall Street will see its balance melt away like snow in a heatwave. 

The BBC comment I really likes was “He added that Mr Meadows’ comments showed that the Trump administration had “given up on their basic duty to protect the American people”, it sets a new stage in the US, the people intentionally opting not to wear a mask are now in a stage where they could optionally be held liable for endangering the lives of others and law firms will be quick to coin in on that too. This will not hold in rural places, but in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Chicago, Philadelphia, Washington DC, New York, and Boston? Yes, there we see a larger problem and the American people will have to choose between wearing a mask (a wise decision) or become optionally the subject of prosecution, in civl and possibly even criminal court. Because this too is the consequence of ‘given up on their basic duty to protect’, it is part of a blame game, when a person cannot point at the government, he or she will seek an alternative and suing is quite popular in America. As such I also feel vindicated in some form, I saw this coming months earlier and when we see “control of the virus was not a realistic goal because “it is a contagious virus just like the flu”” This stage was pretty clear 10 months ago, so why did the US administration set the bar to unrealistic goals? The article ends with a question mark. It is seen with “Speaking to the BBC on Sunday, top US infectious disease expert Dr Anthony Fauci said a Covid-19 vaccine could be available in the US before the end of the year if one proved to be “safe and effective”, but that the first doses would go to people in order of priority. He said it would take “several months into 2021” before the vaccine was more widely available.” There is a large question mark here, mainly because THERE IS NO VACCINE! It is the largest setting in this. I have no intent (or knowledge levels) to go up against Dr. Fauci and it is the stage that we need to see, because the BBC gives us “could be available”, as well as “if one proved to be” the application of ‘could’ and ‘if’, a ‘What-if’ stage with optional parameters and that is not a safe stage to be on. The rest makes sense priority cases first, and optional distribution after but the larger stage is not that distribution will come, but when it will come, there is no vaccine at present and every week it is not out, the distribution will slowly but certainly move towards the second half of 2021. And it is not merely me saying this, ABC gave us 4 days ago “First COVID vaccines on track for early-to-mid next year”, they give us the inclusion of mid next year, a realistic stage, but one that is driven by availability. And that is one of two factors. When the vaccine is a fact, how long do you think it will take to make 2 billion doses? And in this what else will surface? No matter how safe it seemingly is, the stage cannot be managed to make it safe to ALL, anyone who relies on that is plainly stupid. Even as a setting of 100 gave one person who got complications (and seemingly overcame them) it is not a given, we cannot speculate on a 100% success rate, it is short sighted and foolish. 

In September I wrote ‘the worst is yet to come’ and we are nowhere near that stage, so as idiot media (like the Daily Telegraph) create fear with ‘Australians kept in the dark on rollout of a COVID vaccine’, or given false hope with ‘Donald Trump’s advisor claims COVID vaccine will be ready by November’ (all within the last 10 hours), we need to accept one truth, there is at present NO VACCINE, when there is no vaccine there is no viable plan for a rollout, you see a vaccine needs mass production first, so there is that too. Yet, feel free to rely on that stupid fuck Chris Evans (the editor, not the actor). And when the vaccine is finalised in march 2021 (or after that), who will he blame for the articles? 

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September 10, 2020 · 17:18

the Logistical problem

The BBC alerted the people to an upcoming problem. The title ‘Covid vaccine: 8,000 jumbo jets needed to deliver doses globally, says IATA’ (at https://www.bbc.com/news/business-54067499) was used to alert us and it makes sense. Getting the stage of shipping vaccines is a real issue, it is not a small issue getting well over 6,000,000,000 people a dose, even if it is not easy yet. So when I read ““Safely delivering Covid-19 vaccines will be the mission of the century for the global air cargo industry. But it won’t happen without careful advance planning. And the time for that is now,” said IATA’s chief executive Alexandre de Juniac” I get the issue that they are confronted with. It was “Not all planes are suitable for delivering vaccines as they need a typical temperature range of between 2 and 8C for transporting drugs. Some vaccines may require frozen temperatures which would exclude more aircraft” that gave me the idea. I looked up an idea and there it was “To date, more than 2,500 C-130s have been ordered and/or delivered to 63 nations around the world. Seventy countries operate C-130s, which have been produced in more than 70 different variants”, so the Hercules is a military cargo plane and there are 2,500 out there, the benefit is that the Hercules supports the transportation of 10 feet military boxes which also exist in Cooled versions. Aside from that there are a  few other means, so with that, the 8,000 planes required slim down a little. When we consider that 70 countries have an option ready and we know that the larger airlines have transport versions of Boeing planes, we are almost halfway there, the larger issue is the option to have the proper boxes and refrigerated boxes fit, so even if the plane does not refrigerate, the boxes might. So in that setting we see that part of the equation is there. The larger issue is actually not the planes, it is the setting of the amount of vaccines that are required on a global scale. Which gets us to AstraZeneca, who gives us ‘AstraZeneca to supply Europe with up to 400 million doses of Oxford University’s vaccine at no profit’ (at https://www.astrazeneca.com/media-centre/press-releases/2020/astrazeneca-to-supply-europe-with-up-to-400-million-doses-of-oxford-universitys-vaccine-at-no-profit.html), so how much will they charge the 350 remaining Europeans? This is not an attack on them, it is the required question, when the setting is there, when the vaccine is finally done, how many vaccine shots a day will Astra Zeneca be able to manufacture? So as the planes are lining up, consider that it will take roughly 2-3 days for all the vaccines that can be set in one C-130 Hercules, the question becomes are there enough small refrigerated shipping containers? It is a question that the BBC did not ask Alexandre de Juniac and I am not attacking them on it, it looks great to say that 8,000 jumbo’s are needed, but who considered the alternative? The time required to manufacture the vaccines to fill these Jumbo’s? 

And when you consider that 6-8 billion doses are needed, apart from the massive profit (which I am not against), the time required for all this is an actual issue, because anyone thinking that the existence of an vaccine is the end of the matter is wrong, it will merely be the end of the beginning and not realising that is a massive flaw in thinking. No matter how we see it, there is a chance that the vaccine will help most people, just not all of them. “Primary vaccine failure occurs when an organism’s immune system does not produce antibodies when first vaccinated. Vaccines can fail when several series are given and fail to produce an immune response”, we want a vaccine to be a force of good for all, this is not always realistic and the moment we realise that part we get the introduction to the issue at hand: ‘What about the rest?’ Yet that is not an issue we need to worry about for now, the Guardian gives us “Investigators will be examining the details of the illness and the person who contracted it to find out if there is a link. They will also look at the dose of vaccine they received, their state of general health and so on. They will hope this event can be explained and is not a risk to others. If so, the trial will soon resume. Researchers in other vaccine trials – there are nine now in phase 3, which is the last stage – will be looking to ensure they are not seeing a similar issue”, makes perfect sense, and the delay is (as I stated before) optionally short, but we see the media giving us a non-show on the matter of time required to make the vaccines. Again, this is not an attack, yet vaccines are not easily made, one source gave me “Manufacturing vaccines is a complex journey. It takes between 6 to 36 months to produce, package and deliver high quality vaccines to those who need them. It includes testing each batch of vaccine at every step of its journey, and repeat quality control of batches by different authorities around the world”, so even when the formula is ready and approved, there is every chance that the required amount of shipping will not be ready for some time, a stage that will not care how many boeings are required, there is every chance that the Hercules fleet is all that is required to ship whatever is ready, but that realisation will take you a little while and when you are all on par, we realise that soon enough it will be about governments and their needs for their ego and their economy, the setting merely require that stage for people to realise that wars have started over less. A British-Swedish organisation and their largest client (America) demanding 300,000,000 shots on day one, I will let you consider what happens next, it will not be a nice stage.

 

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September 9, 2020 · 16:37

A no-go is not a failure

It happens, things especially in science take a little more than we think it does and it also takes more attempts than one, this was a given from the very beginning, so when I mentioned issues in ‘The worst is yet to come’ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2020/09/06/the-worst-is-yet-to-come/) this wasn’t it. Yet I did give mention of it in a previous article, it was going to take time. So when we get ‘Oxford scientists: these are final steps we’re taking to get our coronavirus vaccine approved’ at September 8, 2020 8.04pm AEST, yet less than 1 hour ago we are treated to ‘AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine trial suspended: Live news’, here we see “AstraZeneca says it has suspended trials of the coronavirus vaccine it is developing with the University of Oxford after one of the trials’ volunteers fell ill with an unexplained illness”, this is not a reason to panic, science will hit bumps and optionally this is merely a bump. Yet this bump translates to time, time that most governments no longer have. Yet it is the nature of things, so as we see “More than 27.5 million people around the world have been diagnosed with the coronavirus and 897,383 have died. More than 18.5 million people have recovered”, we see what some call dire statistics, yet in a population of 8,000 million, is it really dire? 

We also do not need to see ‘CSL unfazed by vaccine trial hold-up’, yet the text “Blood products giant CSL is pushing ahead with its preparations to manufacture the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine, despite the multinational biotech halting its phase three trial on Wednesday” raises questions. Preparations make sense when the situation has been resolved, or the issue is not a real bump, but the text “This is a routine action which has to happen whenever there is a potentially unexplained illness in one of the trials, while it is investigated, ensuring we maintain the integrity of the trials”, gives a larger worry, and when we see governments eager to push out a vaccine is what might be regarded as a false sense of security, who would benefit? Now this is speculative because the situation is fluid, and even as we get the news from several media sources, they tend to have their own agenda and 7 hours ago, ABC gave us ‘Oxford coronavirus vaccine trial on hold over ‘potentially unexplained illness’, AstraZeneca says’, we are treated to the word ‘potentially’, this is actually fair, especially in light of the quote in the ABC article “AstraZeneca said it “voluntarily paused” the phase 3 clinical trial — which kicked off in July — to allow a review of the “single event” by an independent committee”, an action triggered by a single event, the setting of AstraZeneca makes perfect sense. It is a safety setting and here the no-go (for now) is not a failure. There is every chance that we will see the found explanation in the very near future and that makes AstraZeneca the winner.

In the setting of any normal timeline, we got lucky, if (and we emphasise on if) it becomes the cure, we will see that AstraZeneca has broken records in finding an optional cure for a disease that had no cure, no vaccine and that within a year is pretty spectacular. Especially when a timeline up to 18 months was an expected setting. So even if the bump implies that there will be a delay, AstraZeneca is well ahead of schedule, and before we go out on a limb and get crazy, less than a million died, in a setting with 8,000 million people, there is room to manoeuvre.

 

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June 5, 2020 · 20:19

A handjob at twice the price

It started 8 hours ago, the stage that we have been watching on Hydroxychloroquine, an anti malaria drug. The article ‘Influential study on hydroxychloroquine withdrawn’ leaves me with a lot of questions. The quote “An influential article that found hydroxychloroquine increases the risk to death in coronavirus patients” should leave us all with a lot of questions. That is even before we get to the data concerns. Consider that the coronavirus had its initial cases last december (optionally a little earlier), so in January we knew that there was a problem, we also knew that there was NO vaccine at this stage. This was 5 months ago, now we see “Research for the article, published last month in medical journal the Lancet, involved 96,000 coronavirus patients across 671 hospital worldwide. Nearly 15,000 were given hydroxychloroquine – or a related form” In this light, we need to consider that there were enough patients in April, around 3 million, yet as we realise that reporting of Corona cases have been all over the field, so getting 671 hospitals to set up treatments, testings patients and reporting to a source takes time, the incentive for a vaccine started in january/february, and even as they might be on top of their game, the entire setting would require time. As far as I can tell, the situation does not add up. Consider for a moment that there are 4008 forms of approved medication (to coin amere small fat), someone decided to set the stage where hydroxychloroquine was an optional solution, I will not fault that reasoning (as I never studied medicine). So the medication is ‘offered’ as an optional partial solution, there is no vaccine, so still we are all OK. Consider that this started in January, so any negative feedback would not be there until February the earliest. As such, it takes time for possible patterns to form, as such February/March is the start. Now consider that in a period of 60 days, a report was filed with the foundation of ‘hydroxychloroquine increases the risk to deaths in coronavirus patients’, and keep in mind the ‘increases risk’ part, it matters.

You see the timeline to assess and identify ‘increases risk’ is not done in 90 days, the entire path would require all kinds of data on multiple levels and under larger scrutiny, the entire matter should be under scrutiny and should be up for debate in many places

Now we are in a stage where in under 90 days 96,000 patients are measured, 15,000 are documented on the effects of hydroxychloroquine on these patients and the effect and evidence of death due to medication. The timeline does not make sense, so personally, I would state Yes! I very much want to test and scrutinise that data. I would in addition make a memorandum with critical questions to Surgisphere, the timeline leaves me with questions and the data and evidence path would require investigations (in multiple ways), as such when I see this article, I am left with several questions, I also have questions in the direction of Harvard professor Mandeep Mehra. Not in a hostile way, but the entire setting leaves me with a bad taste in my mouth and the professor could end up answering questions. 

So in all 96,000 patients over 90 days at the max, gives us well over 1050 patients a day, after that we have the stage of 166 patients on the drug a day and over a period of 90 days, not all have been properly tested, the stage of data gathering and data collection with tests and setting the proper stage of analyses, verification and reporting. I see a whole range of issues from a distance. Oh, and with the lockdown, how many resources would have been available? We see nothing of this entire field in the BBC article or anywhere else. 

Did someone look into the matter on an empty stomach? 

These managers chasing quick wins are shown to be be lacking in a few ways, I hope that the professor has a good explanation, he most likely does, and perhaps Surgisphere, but the entire data matter is not as I personally see it some ‘client agreement’ issue, I see it as something a lot more serious, and if it was up to me at this stage, unless Surgisphere cannot answer all questions to the satisfaction of all, they should never ever be allowed near medical data ever again. I am not alone in this, some people have been asking serious questions for days, some have has question marks on a few items that I mentioned and most include issues of data collection, it is time for serious organisations to step in, we would ask the WHO, but it seems that America is not paying that bill, so who would properly vet data of this magnitude?

 

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