covid-19

[RandBlade]

No. I'm not suggesting other countries haven't failed either. That's equally scandalous.

You don't have to explain that people die in a pandemic. You're being a bit extreme and silly to suggest it's that or strip everyone of their civil liberties. As with all things in life, there's a balance. And generally speaking our government got that balance monumentally wrong.

I'm suggesting that the long and combined list of our government failures during this pandemic is a bigger scandal than the EU being slower than us at procuring, approving and rolling out a vaccine.

It's obviously a subjective thing and we could go round and round with posts and obviously not change each other's minds, because we're both pretty stubborn sometimes, so let's just agree to disagree, old chap.

Generally speaking they got it right. They may have sometimes erred on the side of civil liberties, if so that's not a bad thing. Some mistakes have been made, but that's generally true everywhere in the world.

The UK didn't just help procure a vaccine. We helped develop the vaccine that can be used at normal temperatures around the globe, it was paid for in large part by UK Taxpayers PLC, exported at cost to the whole globe (there will be billions of doses this year alone), ensured it was domestically produced and manufactured, developed a logistics plan for the procured supercold vaccines, developed and implemented a logistics rollout, developed the best scientific advice on how to roll out the vaccine - leading the world in finding the 12 week rollout solution that the WHO is now looking at recommending worldwide, and has led the world in fundraising and planning for vaccinating not just this country but the entire planet so we can put this pandemic behind us.

The vaccine development, manufacturing and rollout has been the single biggest problem, the single biggest solution, the single most important answer to the entire pandemic. This matters more than everything else combined. This is the end, this is the way out - and we have developed the path for others to follow to put this pandemic behind us. This trumps everything.

[RandBlade]

Good thread by someone involved in getting the Oxford vaccine up and running.

Twitter Link

[gogobongopop]

Generally speaking they got it right. They may have sometimes erred on the side of civil liberties, if so that's not a bad thing. Some mistakes have been made, but that's generally true everywhere in the world.

The UK didn't just help procure a vaccine. We helped develop the vaccine that can be used at normal temperatures around the globe, it was paid for in large part by UK Taxpayers PLC, exported at cost to the whole globe (there will be billions of doses this year alone), ensured it was domestically produced and manufactured, developed a logistics plan for the procured supercold vaccines, developed and implemented a logistics rollout, developed the best scientific advice on how to roll out the vaccine - leading the world in finding the 12 week rollout solution that the WHO is now looking at recommending worldwide, and has led the world in fundraising and planning for vaccinating not just this country but the entire planet so we can put this pandemic behind us.

The vaccine development, manufacturing and rollout has been the single biggest problem, the single biggest solution, the single most important answer to the entire pandemic. This matters more than everything else combined. This is the end, this is the way out - and we have developed the path for others to follow to put this pandemic behind us. This trumps everything.

No. Generally speaking we made a long list of failures resulting in one of the highest death counts and worse economic hits in the world.

You can thank our aggressive vaccine strategy on nothing else but desperate necessity, more so than almost anywhere else on the planet.

Replay the last 12 months with the exact same political policies and decisions but with Jeremy Corbyn and Dianne Abbott in charge, and you'd be singing a very different tune.

[RandBlade]

The story isn't over yet. "Highest death counts" is already false, we have already lower than many other nations - despite being unfortunate enough to have Cockney Covid evolve here while we had lower number of cases than most of western Europe at the time - and we have the highest vaccination rate of any large country on the entire planet, third highest when you include small countries. Sadly other countries, without the vaccine, are going to see their death toll rise while ours does not. The situation in Portugal and other countries in Europe right now looks absolutely tragic and heartbreaking. I will take no pleasure in that, I will be sad not happy to see them overtake us in deaths per capita, I am assuming you won't take pleasure in it either? Its not a fucking league sport afterall.

"Worst economic hits" is probably incredibly false too and wait a year or two to see how it goes. Quite frankly data right now is not remotely like-for-like. The way we measure GDP is a part of the reason why the UK GDP dropped faster than other nations, but will rise faster too afterwards - we attempt to measure public sector output via metrics of output. Other countries measure it as a multiplier of wages. That means for example that a British Oncologist who has seen fewer patients this year for screening has seen a drop in their output and thus a drop in output and thus a drop in GDP. In many other countries since the doctor has seen no drop in his wages, he has the same contribution to GDP as expected previously. The UK will also see a return to normal before other countries too because of the vaccine rollout.

Jeremy Corbyn and Diane Abbott wouldn't have done the same policies and decisions. I've called out policies and decisions I oppose.

[gogobongopop]

When this is over, if other countries have a higher death toll and worse economic impact than us, it'll not change the fact that the long list of UK government failures is a bigger scandal than the EUs vaccine approach.

As you say, it's not a league table.

It doesn't mean other government's aren't making failures either.

There will be a monumental amount to learn about this sorry saga and what we got wrong, unnecessarily.

[RandBlade]

What possible failure is worse than not paying to develop a vaccine?

What possible failure is worse than not paying to manufacture a vaccine?

People dying because there's a pandemic going on for which there is no treatment, cure or vaccine is one thing. People dying because there's a pandemic for which a vaccine exists but you can't be bothered to pay for the vaccine or you'd rather pander to antivax sentimentality . . . that is worse.

There will be lessons to learn going forwards, hopefully primarily in the future if we ever have a lockdown then quarantine hotels for the border should be #1 lesson. To see people going on holiday to Dubai while children are stuck at home - that is an incredible blunder. But vaccines were always going to be the way out and being antivax is the worst blunder of all.

[Aimless]

I acknowledge when things go wrong here. I've called for changes. When mistakes happen like not instituting mandatory hotel quarantine allowing the virus to be reimported I've called it out.

You though - you roll around in the sewer muck like the lowest of Trumpists denying any wrongdoing or mistakes whatsoever.

Faced with undeniable facts . . .

AimlessTrump: Nothing to see here.

Contracts signed three months apart.
AimlessTrump: Nothing to see here.

Sidney Powell VDL: No best efforts in the contract.
Contract: "Best reasonable efforts" in contract 15 times.
AimlessTrump: Nothing to see here.

There is a scandal here. The scandal is that during a pandemic, for which the only reasonable exit is a vaccine, the EU were late at ordering the vaccine, didn't pay enough for extra facilities to produce the vaccine (hence why its cheaper per dose at cost in the EU than in the UK - a concept you couldn't seem to get your head around), that people are getting angry at deaths and a lack of a vaccine and now they're flailing about to blame others - and you're happily throwing away any integrity you once had to muckrake and buy those lies.

Thank you for once again illustrating how much you suck at reading. Let me help you go through our latest exchange, once again doing your job for you.

You have made several specific claims about causal relationships, and I have disputed the specifics of those claims. If you had asked me whether I think the EU was too slow, I would've said yes. If you'd asked me whether I think the EU's slowness was a bad thing, I, again, would've said yes. If you had asked me whether I agree that the EU had been too slow and that their slowness is why Swedish meatballs suck, I would've said no—even though I agree with both sides of that claim, I do not agree with the relationship you would be trying to prove in that scenario.

You made specific claims about charts showing relationships that they do not show. For example, you were convinced that slow rollout in EU countries were attributable to the EU's tardiness with signing, posting charts to prove your case, when the reality was that, at that stage—and probably still—most of those countries were not constrained by supply, and were slow for a variety of other reasons (see eg. the Dutch issues). Some countries did indeed run into supply constraints—later. Supply constraints will be more important moving forward.

Then you endorsed just the dumbest and most easily debunked completely false conspiracy theory about the French making the EU snub Pfizer in order to corruptly benefit Sanofi, based on an image with false information that you—due to your laziness and your Francophobia—uncritically accepted, and indeed went off on a ridiculous rant over. I disputed your conspiracy theory, because it not only appeared absurd but was demonstrably false—the contracts were not signed when they were claimed to have been signed, and the rationale for signing a deal with Sanofi was entirely in line with precisely the rationale you had praised the UK for applying and criticized the EU for failing to apply.

After this, you—like an idiot—started repeatedly posting a chart to argue for a direct linear relationship between per capita vaccine-related expenditures—unclear which, as the data is not described, and the source itself indicates that the spending is not comparable—for the EU alone, and vaccination rates for the EU as a whole at that point. And, like an idiot, you threw a fit when I—rightly—disputed this asinine implication that any such direct and linear relationship exists; you were mad because you felt like your "side" was being cheated out of "points" that it "deserved", but I have no interest in your partisan grubbing for points—I am only interested in understanding what is happening and why. The truth is that there is no direct linear relationship between undefined per capita vaccine-related expenditure and vaccination rates across a 27-country-bloc. There are no doubt relationships between the two—but many of them are indirect and not linear. Sadly, you attempted to throw in some barbs about the EU not pulling their weight, when it turns out the EU has pledged 25-26 EUR per capita on supporting a global initiative to secure low-income countries' access to a variety of crucial resources in order to fight the pandemic.

For a long while, you've been making a number of specific claims re. scientific and clinical aspects of vaccines and vaccination regimens, several of which are either false, misleading or not supported by evidence. I have disputed your—and your govt's and sources'—specific claims about those matters, with a particular focus on their reasoning. I have not said that opting for a breadth-first strategy is wrong; I have discussed what I believe are some important limitations of the arguments that have been used to justify that strategy, and what I think might bolster the case for using that strategy. You have responded to this like a blinkered partisan moron obsessed with whose "side" is getting points, because that is all you're capable of thinking about. Asked to substantiate your claims that the type of evidence I would like to see not only exists but has been published, you have posted links that contain literally nothing like what was requested—presumably because you can't read good and can't do other stuff good too.

And that brings us to the latest episode, in which you have built on your previous dubious claims to make specific claims about what the EU's contract with AZN does and does not say, and what the company's obligations are or aren't, in addition to honestly kinda lame excuses that make me wonder about your reliability as a businessman. I have disputed several specific aspects of those claims, and I have explained why. For the purposes of the initial EU doses, AZN's "best reasonable efforts" include production capacity at two specified UK sites, with an assurance from the company that the UK contract is not an impediment to their efforts to use the resources at their disposal to deliver on the EU order. My interpretation has since been acknowledged by others reporting or commenting on the matter. More importantly, I have argued that the company must have known weeks ago that it would not come even close to meeting its target, and that it should've notified the Commission back then—so that they could together work out ways to mitigate the problem, eg. by securing additional production capacity—which they now have, after smoothing things over with the Commission. I have pointed out that your confused reasoning about the Commission's motives does not hold up in light of how Pfizer's delays have gone.

In your latest post, you continue to make claims that are false, again showing that you are either illiterate or a liar. For example, you claim that VdL said, "No best efforts in the contract." That is categorically untrue; what she said was that the best efforts clauses in the contract are not an excuse, which is accurate—because reasonable best efforts do not preclude AZN notifying the Commission in a timely manner, and should not have precluded the use of contractually promised UK production capacity if the company had been upfront about their commitments. She also specifically stated that the best efforts clauses have no bearing on contractual obligations to deliver on orders—in AZN's case, they pertain to—among other things—the company's obligation to build capacity required to fulfill the order. It is AZN's responsibility to know what it needs in order to accomplish that, and there are also a number of best efforts clauses that serve to encourage cooperation between the parties in securing the necessary resources. But the main point is that VdL has explicitly referred to the best efforts clauses in the contract—to dispute their relevance to the matter at hand; it is simply false—stupid, ignorant, possibly illiterate—to claim that she has stated that the words themselves do not exist in the contract. In the interview in question, she also took the time to acknowledge what a massive challenge these endeavours were, and that delays and the like were to be expected, but that those issues can and should be dealt with honestly, with full transparency—as Pfizer did, and AZN did not.

It is remarkable and honestly quite upsetting how frequently I have to correct your false claims. Whether they stem from your inability to read or a penchant for lying has become irrelevant at this point. A person who misrepresents the truth so frequently cannot be said to have any integrity at all. I'm not surprised you're so fond of the habitual liar that is your PM.

[RandBlade]

"most of those countries were not constrained by supply"

I can't tell if you're a liar or a fool if you're still saying there's no supply constraints. Supply is the only limiting factor that matters above all others. If you're saying that eg the Netherlands have the supply to have jabbed 13 people per 100 by now but have only bothered to do 1 then that's an even more incredible scandal. But its bullshit. You know it, I know it. You're just dealing with "alternative facts".

If any nation has a decent supply why hasn't a single nation done a decent amount of jabs yet. You're saying all 27 have just failed with rollout simultaneously while having an abundance of supply?

[Hazir]

Actually, shortage of doses does not play any role in the Dutch situation AT ALL. The problems are home made and a result of a lack of an enforced steering principle. This resulted in a program that is so void of logic that you'd almost believe they want it to fail. Until you remember it perfectly serves the needs of the bean counters on the one side and the privacy zealots on the other side.

[RandBlade]

I'm sure doing 1 dose per 100 people, when other countries in the EU have 2-4 doses per 100 is in no small part a rollout issue. But I don't think you're sat idly on a supply of ~15 doses per 100.

OTOH countries that started out with a big bang of vaccinations like Denmark have ground to a crawl now as they've ran out of supply. France did more vaccines yesterday per capita than Denmark did - that's not because France has a better rollout than Denmark.

[Aimless]

"most of those countries were not constrained by supply"

I can't tell if you're a liar or a fool if you're still saying there's no supply constraints. Supply is the only limiting factor that matters above all others. If you're saying that eg the Netherlands have the supply to have jabbed 13 people per 100 by now but have only bothered to do 1 then that's an even more incredible scandal. But its bullshit. You know it, I know it. You're just dealing with "alternative facts".

If any nation has a decent supply why hasn't a single nation done a decent amount of jabs yet. You're saying all 27 have just failed with rollout simultaneously while having an abundance of supply?

I'm saying that most of them have prioritized a fairly small group—institutionalized elderly and HCWs—and that they have been slow to roll out for a variety of reasons. For example, Sweden has received around 410k doses, but only administered 230-250k. Supply is not the constraint here. The figure you're citing for NL is not accurate. Many popular sites track doses that have been reported as being administered, and there are substantial delays in reporting; Dutch govt. source estimates the number is twice as high, and I expect they've been delivered twice that number of doses. Again, not a supply constraint, but a slow rollout. If the Dutch had opted to eg. vaccinate everyone with only one dose and done so at full speed, they would likely have vaccinated twice as many people as they have. These are two illustrative examples, and you can do the same with every other country to see which ones are up against a supply constraint and which ones are just slow, for whatever reason.

Given that you lied about VdL's statement in your previous reply to me, perhaps you should reconsider your charge against me.

[RandBlade]

You keep projecting. There was no lie from me.

All countries use a proportion of what they have, but you're delusional if you think a country had a decent supply, lets say 4x what they've got, then they wouldn't use any more whatsoever.

Anyway, on this jolly thought, goodnight.

Twitter Link

[Aimless]

You literally lied about her statement RB.

[RandBlade]

Twitter Link

"The phrase "best effort" does not exist" - pretty categorical. The phrase "best reasonable effort" OTOH does exist, 15 times.

The fact that she said that was repeated all over the media. Oh yes, and that Tweet was quoted by . . . you.

But yes I "lied" and made that up and inserted it into your post . . . stop dealing with "alternate facts" AimlessTrump.

[RandBlade]

Twitter Link

Good answer to any antivax fools still out there.

[Flixy]

Not really to be honest. What's the hospitalization rate for non vaccinated people in the same period across the same age group?

[RandBlade]

The latest available UK data is there are currently 34,783 patients in hospital with Covid 19. Approximately 1 in every 1916 people are currently hospitalised.

Across the different vaccines in the trials quoted that would be 38 people currently hospitalised - and that's only on current data. It doesn't involve any churn over a period of months as real life does.

Age groups may distort that but it's worth noting that while over 80s make up a majority of deaths they are a minority of hospitalisations. The bulk of the hospitalisations are actually 40-65 but the difference is they're more likely to recover while over 80s struggle to do so.

[Aimless]

Twitter Link

"The phrase "best effort" does not exist" - pretty categorical. The phrase "best reasonable effort" OTOH does exist, 15 times.

The fact that she said that was repeated all over the media. Oh yes, and that Tweet was quoted by . . . you.

But yes I "lied" and made that up and inserted it into your post . . . stop dealing with "alternate facts" AimlessTrump.

The claim is false, and the fact that it is false should have been immediately apparent from even a cursory account of her statements in the interview. Most likely someone made a translation error which was then further exacerbated by someone taking it out of context. The fact that the claim was false has since become very clear, and your continued repetition of the falsehood is now a lie.

[Aimless]

Twitter Link

Good answer to any antivax fools still out there.

This is a good illustration of how much more useful the other trials are compared to AZN's

Not really to be honest. What's the hospitalization rate for non vaccinated people in the same period across the same age group?

It's an important objection. Afaict, though AZN's trial data is especially problematic because of this concern, the others are pretty useful. Interpretation of all the studies is complicated a little bit by differences in and changes to the underlying risk brought on by the state of the pandemic at those sites, and the imposition of restrictions etc, but the benefit is so great that it doesn't end up mattering except for specific policy concerns (eg. if you have two vaccines that are about to become available at more or less the same time, which should you prioritize and for whom?) and research. XKCD said it best—strive to have something so good that you don't need any fancy maths

[Aimless]

The fact that she said that was repeated all over the media. Oh yes, and that Tweet was quoted by . . . you.

But yes I "lied" and made that up and inserted it into your post . . . stop dealing with "alternate facts" AimlessTrump.

And oh my God, you lying/illiterate clown, here's what I actually said in response to that tweet, in the post where I quoted it:

Khen and Hazir, can either of you confirm that this is a sufficiently accurate representation of her comments? It seems implausible. At the same time, her call to have the contract made public suggests she and her team clearly disagree with Soriot's characterization of their agreement. Feel like something has been lost in translation, either wrt this interview, or wrt the communication between the Commission and AZN/Soriot.

Followed by:

One of you is misreading her statement. It describes a view of what "best efforts" (or "best reasonable efforts") clauses mean for the company's obligations to deliver on the contract.

Ie. I immediately suspected her comment had been misrepresented, and later explained how it had been misrepresented. You're a liar—doubly so, because you're lying (once again) about what I said. That, RB, is the hallmark of Trumpism—a lack of respect for the truth, expressed as a pathological tendency to lie about things that are obviously and verifiably untrue. I wanted to hold off on answering Hazir's earlier question about what explains your behavior best, but I'm now leaning towards an answer.

[Aimless]

Yikes

Twitter Link

[Timbuk2]

Yikes

Twitter Link

" tensions worsened in recent months as state health officials said they often found out about major changes in pandemic policy only after Mr. Cuomo announced them at news conferences — and then asked them to match their health guidance to the announcements."

[Flixy]

The latest available UK data is there are currently 34,783 patients in hospital with Covid 19. Approximately 1 in every 1916 people are currently hospitalised.

Across the different vaccines in the trials quoted that would be 38 people currently hospitalised - and that's only on current data. It doesn't involve any churn over a period of months as real life does.

Age groups may distort that but it's worth noting that while over 80s make up a majority of deaths they are a minority of hospitalisations. The bulk of the hospitalisations are actually 40-65 but the difference is they're more likely to recover while over 80s struggle to do so.

That's assuming the population has the same age distribution as the test persons, which AFAIK is not correct (and that's ignoring comorbidities). And for some studies, e.g. AZN the number of participants is not much higher than the ~2k you report (plus I don't know how long the trials lasted, and how long people are in hospital etc.).

Don't get me wrong, I am not anti-vaccination or anything, I just don't like sloppy, cheap arguments like this. Plus it sets you up for validating anti-vac supporters if anything - what if there was a hospitalization? Vaccine is probably still fine, but your argument just went down the toilet (and let's face it, there will be examples of hospitalizations). And then your argument is seen as either wrong or dishonest, and good luck convincing the other person then.

Not to mention it only lists covid related hospitalization, technically injecting bleach would also result in zero covid related hospitalizations In a more serious argument, this would also exclude hospitalizations due to side effects.

TLDR, I don't like soundbites based on shoddy arguments. I do like well-working vaccines though!


Not related, but the reported daily number of infections here is at the level where it was 1st of October, and dropping. We may be royally screwing up vaccinations, but the spread of the virus is at least somewhat reducing (for now), and that's probably without the bulk of effect of the curfew (assuming it had an effect). Curfew likely ends next week somewhere, shops are still closed until at least the end of the month (though more shops will likely be allowed to be open for pickups only).

[gogobongopop]

Twitter Link
Wow - Italy are doing pretty well.

[RandBlade]

Only Israel doing it in any meaningful numbers yet. Not sure why that's an "Oh wow" - everyone seems to know Israel has done a stunning job.

I'm guessing UAE and Bahrain are wisely doing the 12 week strategy too like we are. Very clever them, funny that doesn't seem to have received much media attention if any?

I expect by the end of March we should start to see significant numbers of second doses in places other than Israel.

[wiggin]

I am continually depressed how most governments - mine included - have done such an awful job on the rollout. Supply isn't the rate limiting step here and it should be! All this requires is basic coordination - get X people into location Y at Z time, and have an appropriate dose and healthcare worker there to administer it. It's logistics, that's it. And they had months and months to prepare for it. Every country that isn't Israel should be ashamed right now if they aren't pushing against their supply constraints.

I have a friend who now works in biotech and he's livid about the mess. He had a good point: Pfizer delivered an incredibly sophisticated product on a ridiculously short time scale - every single box of doses has GPS tracking, detailed temperature history, and a continuous record of custody and batch production going back to raw materials. I doubt if there has ever been this scale of distribution of something with such restrictive storage conditions on such a short time scale. They know exactly where and how much vaccine there is and have shown that it works. Yet the government simply needs to get the damn thing into people's arms and they can't manage that. It's embarrassing, and we should demand better.

This, possibly more than any other government fuckup, makes me very leery of giving big and complex tasks to the government. If it was limited to specific countries or localities, I'd wave it off as 'bad' government. But given that only one country seems to be doing an even remotely acceptable job, I'd say they're the exception and not the rule.

[RandBlade]

I think a lot of countries are running into supply constraints. The UK numbers are supply constrained and a number of European countries have had to cancel vaccination drives due to a shortage of supply.

I wholeheartedly agree with you that supply should be the biggest issue. If you have supply you can't be bothered to use that is insane.

[wiggin]

I haven't been able to find data on doses on hand for much of anyone, have you?

[RandBlade]

No its a closely guarded secret for most countries it seems.

But I've seen many reports of places halting vaccinations because they've got no supplies. So either the supplies are being used, or the logistics to get them to the front line aren't there.

[wiggin]

No its a closely guarded secret for most countries it seems.

But I've seen many reports of places halting vaccinations because they've got no supplies. So either the supplies are being used, or the logistics to get them to the front line aren't there.

Localities not having adequate doses are entirely different than if the country/state has them. All countries should be right up against their supply limitations, and I doubt that's happening. It certainly hasn't happened in Massachusetts, and we're doing better than some places.