[0762]

Theo making a good point again re that fanfare over the Astra vaccine eh! Highly effective eh said the bbc report!? Could have major consequences for a vaccination strategy in the country eh!? And then it suddenly "comes to light" the low-dose "regime" was in fact a result of a serious dosing error - the amount of vaccine for the Brazilian portion of the trial was miscalculated and subsequently admitted by Astrazeneca!!? Luckily the error was in the form of a dilution and volunteers suffered no harm. Astonishing when one considers this serious breach being part of a clinical trial! Then it was confirmed that the numbers involved in the dosage error was rebranded as "half dose-full dose" regime and was 2741 but crucially no one over 55 received this dose. Therefore there is no scientific evidence, yet presented, that this vaccine is effective at 90% in the over-55s. The best that can be said at this stage is the 62% efficacy claim based on the 8895 volunteers (presumably from a wider age group range) who received the correct dose. So immediate concerns raised in regard to immunising the over-55s in the immediate future with a vaccine that appears to provide a relatively poor level of protection compared with vaccines produced by other companies. Since the bulk order of vaccines by UK govt is from AZ, the question arises, ""Do we really wanna give our elderly and vulnerable a 62% efficacy vaccine while others are available with higher protection rates"? Furthermore, questions must be raised about how much Mr Hancock and his boss, PM Johnson, knew about the probs over the AZ/Oxford trial when the "interim results" were announced a few days ago and why they failed to be transparent over the lack of evidence for high levels of efficacy in the over 55s comparable with other vaccines emerging? Could it be that the sudden positive news re other vaccines suddenly prompted the AZ people to tout their vaccine prematurely and are the backers of this project again interested Tory supporting individuals??? Just a thought!!