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A comment on South African variant can break through Pfizer vaccine, Israeli study says. Parent comment

Re:South African variant can break through Pfizer vaccine, I... by throwaway4good on Sunday April 11, 2021 @03:57AM (#26768425)
No. It is not meaningless. Had the vaccine had the same efficacy on the various variants, the ratio between them would have been the same. However it is not, indicating that the vaccine is vastly (factor of 8) more effective on the main variant compared to the SA / Brazil variants. Hence the conclusion.

It could do with more data but that has also been the case for similar studies of the AstraZenaca vaccine.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:South African variant can break through Pfizer vaccine, I... by Method-X on Sunday April 11, 2021 @06:27AM (#26769212)
Wouldn’t you need more than 800 people to get a statistically significant result?
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Re:South African variant can break through Pfizer vaccine, I... by throwaway4good on Sunday April 11, 2021 @08:30AM (#26769874)
They check for significance in the paper. There is no magical sample size number. It depends on the size of the effect which here appears to be quite strong so a smaller sample would actually do.
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Re:South African variant can break through Pfizer vaccine, I... by TeeMassive on Sunday April 11, 2021 @04:06PM (#26772978)
There's a factor of 8 because there are 8 variant cases. This is meaningless.
[ Parent | on HN ]