It has been clear for a while now that the Pfizer vaccine works and is safe. Just because Pfizer has chosen to keep collecting data doesn't make that there is any doubt about that. This is also why control groups have been given the option to get vaccinated too. It would be highly questionable to prevent them from getting vaccinated when we know that some of them might die without the vaccine.
And Pfizer doesn't "make" 1.9b of 100m doses. They might have 1.9b in revenue but producing the vaccines isn't free. And 1.9b is a tiny drop in the bucket compared to the savings we have already seen thanks to the vaccine.
Yes, except there is an established process for quantifying "clear for a while now" and it involves sufficient time and control groups. That process isn't being followed and it is concerning for a number of reasons, including the effect of political pressure on expedited drug approvals in the future now that this precedent is being set. The elected leaders capable of bringing such political pressure to bear are invested in the very companies which stand so much to gain by relaxing the time-tested regulatory approval process. This is bad science and bad governance.
Many drug and vaccine approvals in the past have been done before the trial has run its full course. Many drug and vaccine trials have given the placebo group the real drug once safety and efficacy is clear - before the end of the trial.
This is not new, and frankly I’m a little surprised to see such conspiracy theories on HN.
Note the date on this article - this was back in February of this year: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/02/19/9691430...
Don't denigrate a perfectly valid criticism of deviations from historical norms of drug validation and approval by calling it a "conspiracy theory".
Continued assignment of subjects to placebo is unethical, once there is good evidence to support the efficacy of the trial therapy.
Unfortunately (or fortunately) since there was such strong evidence to prove the efficacy, it became unethical for the continued assignment of placebo.
https://www.ahajournals.org/doi/10.1161/CIRCHEARTFAILURE.111...
Here's an article on the ethics of a placebo-controlled trial in the first place. It's complicated.
https://acrpnet.org/2018/12/06/ethical-deliberations-on-usin...
Anyway none of your comments actually address the science involved. A few factoids without any context is not useful.
Garasdil was approved by the FDA in 2006 and, as this press release shows [0], continued running studies into it as a condition of the approval. They conceded that full results could not be available before approval; “While the study period was not long enough for cervical cancer to develop, the prevention of these cervical precancerous lesions is believed highly likely to result in the prevention of those cancers.”
From what I can gather, the Phase III study participants continued to receive follow-up checks for at least a decade.
[0]https://web.archive.org/web/20091019080918/https://www.fda.g...
[0] https://www.fda.gov/news-events/press-announcements/fda-appr...
[1] https://www.wsj.com/articles/fast-track-drug-approval-design...
The completion date was changed multiple times since April 2020 and they clearly appended booster trials to the existing trials and pushed back the dates.
It truly is that simple.
[0] https://apnews.com/article/coronavirus-pandemic-health-941fc...
I feel like people keep forgetting the definition of "public health crisis."
Time is lives. And economic dollars.
The standard process is designed around limiting harm. Not rapid delivery. Not maximizing good.
In times of business as usual, that's fine. In times of public health crises, it's not.
If we'd rapid approved HIV / AIDS treatments in the 1980s, the world as a whole would have been better.
1. The FDA requires six months of clinical data to establish safety before FDA approval. The normal requirements for FDA approval absolutely were followed
2. With longer-term studied it's not like we don't know anything about them until it's complete. Data is released on a rolling basis so we know how the results of the studies so far, and (surprise!) data so far say it's safe.
Evidence?
> Transparency advocates have criticised the ... (FDA) decision not to hold a formal advisory committee meeting to discuss Pfizer’s application for full approval of its covid-19 vaccine ... Kim Witczak ... a consumer representative on the FDA’s Psychopharmacologic Drugs Advisory Committee, said the decision removed an important mechanism for scrutinising the data ... "The public deserves a transparent process, especially as the call for boosters and mandates are rapidly increasing. These meetings offer a platform where questions can be raised, problems tackled, and data scrutinised in advance of an approval" ... She warned that without a meeting “we have no idea what the data looks like.”
“It is already concerning that full approval is being based on 6 months’ worth of data despite the clinical trials designed for two years,” she said. “There is no control group after Pfizer offered the product to placebo participants before the trials were completed. “Full approval of covid-19 vaccines must be done in an open public forum for all to see. It could set a precedent of lowered standards for future vaccine approvals.”
... Joshua Sharfstein ... former FDA deputy commissioner during the Obama administration, said that advisory committee meetings were more than just a way of receiving scientific input from outside experts. “It’s also an opportunity to educate the public about the important work that the FDA has done reviewing an enormous amount of data about a product,” he told The BMJ. “It’s a chance for questions to be asked and answered, building public confidence."
Yes the vaccine has been proven to be safe for most adults in the short-term. But blanket statements like this over-simplify the reality of the situation.
People need to be aware that for certain sub-populations (eg pediatrics & pregnant women), there is insufficient scientific evidence - in terms of clinical trials and longitudinal studies - to conclude that the benefits of vaccination always and universally outweigh the risks.
Until consensus has been established in the scientific literature - and even after that - everyone should be making their own decisions based on personal risk evaluation with the consultation of doctors and other medical professionals.
There is, of course, an INCREDIBLE amount of EVIDENCE for all of these things being safe (including the vaccine). There has simply never been a 100% complete full evaluation of safety to the rigorous standards of an academic paper.
But it's really important to understand that we know TONS of things without having that rigor, and we don't hold the vast majority of our life to that standard.
Heck, we outright know that driving IS dangerous, ridiculously so compared to taking a vaccine, but we still allow that.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC300808/
:D
While we are not QUITE as clearcut as parachutes, this is still an area where we can reasonably conclude that the vaccine is vastly safer than being unvaccinated.
Somewhere between our two points is an optimal middle ground. The holy grail of exclusively evidence based interventions is lofty no doubt, and we'll have to do the best with what we know right now, but to aim for anything less is quite difficult to defend.
I don't need an academic, peer-reviewed study to tell me that using this site is safe. I don't need one to tell me that masks are safe. It's NICE to have such things, and I'm NOT opposed to them, but they are also NOT necessary for day-to-day reasoning.
I do think we should continue vaccine trials, because we might uncover subtle risks. But until we do, we are in fact at a point where we can conclude that the vaccine is significantly safer than going unvaccinated. What we expect to find going forward is small refinements like "X group should prioritize Y vaccine", not "Y vaccine is in fact more dangerous than Covid"
> we are in fact at a point where we can conclude that the vaccine is significantly safer than going unvaccinated
You keep coming back to "vaccinated versus unvaccinated" rhetoric and using irrelevant logical reasoning to argue that we should hastily generalize safety results to these sub-populations without citing any scientific literature supporting your claim.
The reality of the situation is a lot more complex, and it's obvious you're neglecting these nuances because for example, you fail to acknowledge how immunity acquired through natural infection is a major factor in the tradeoffs of vaccinating these understudied sub-populations.
I'm open to further debate, but I won't continue responding if you continue to raise the same unsupported arguments.
I never argued for "hasty" or "generalization."
Simple question: which sub-population are you talking about? Please exclude any sub-population where a statistically significant sample of vaccinated individuals already exists, unless your concern is limited solely to long-term side effects.
If you are concerned about long-term side effects, please cite at least one scientific study explaining why you are concerned about that PARTICULAR sub-group being vulnerable to that PARTICULAR side effect - we wouldn't want to waste time if you can't cite any scientific literature supporting your claim
(P.S. I've only made a single comment about vaccinated -vs- unvaccinated, so you might have me confused with someone else in this thread)
> Given that COVID-19 disease is far milder in the majority of children than in adults, the risk–benefit of a pediatric SARS-CoV-2 vaccine must be carefully weighed [0]
> The prognostic significance, long-term implications and mechanism of this myocardial injury needs to be studied further, especially as vaccination efforts are rolled out to younger children. [1]
> While the safety, immunogenicity, and efficacy data for the 4 authorized vaccines are reassuring so far, none of these vaccines has been systematically studied in pregnant and breastfeeding people [2]
> it is important to remain transparent about the lack of information, acknowledge concerns, and support those who decide to defer vaccination until more data are available [2]
[0] SARS-CoV-2 vaccine testing and trials in the pediatric population: biologic, ethical, research, and implementation challenges (Feb 2021) https://www.nature.com/articles/s41390-021-01402-z
[1] COVID-19 Vaccination-Associated Myocarditis in Adolescents (August 2021) https://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/pediatrics/ea...
[2] SARS-CoV-2 Vaccination During Pregnancy: A Complex Decision (April 2021) https://academic.oup.com/ofid/article/8/5/ofab180/6220034
What are you advocating for? Your own Source Two backs me up here - we have plenty of reason to conclude that Covid is the bigger risk despite the lack of studies. It's right there in the "Conclusion" section.
Emphasis on "likely" - the authors do not conclude with any certainty, they're speculating based on the available evidence, just like you.
I guess your personal threshold for "plenty of reason to conclude" is lower than mine, and that's okay - to each their own.
But it's very clearly spelled out in the sources I cited: currently there is limited evidence demonstrating the safety and benefit profiles needed to conclude that every child and every pregnant woman should be vaccinated.
I see your point that more research is better, but given the current uncertainty you still have to decide whether Covid or Vaccine is the bigger risk, and all the science says that Covid is the bigger risk.
I'm honestly not sure where we disagree.
2. New data shows that the vaccine is indeed safe for pregnant women and it's not recommended that everyone 12 and older get a vaccine.
https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2021/s0811-vaccine-safe-p...
For pregnant women the current data is that vaccination is conclusively necessary because they cannot possibly hope to avoid COVID-19 infection when giving birth and while pregnant are much more likely to be severely impacted by COVID-19.[1]
[1] https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/spec...
Yes just about any symptomatic illness is going to lead to hospitalization and complications during pregnancy.
I understand how the language on the CDC page you cited may lead you to believe that vaccines are conclusively recommended, but take a look at this page from the CDC [1] (updated August 11th) for a more balance appraisal. They say that evidence about the safety is "limited" but "early data" is reassuring. Almost all of the links on the page you cited are to ongoing trials. It's a misrepresentation of science to say that the recommendation to vaccinate pregnant women is conclusive.
And if we're trading anecdotes, my wife's OBGYN advised her not to get vaccinated yet, because it's unclear what the long-term risks are for mother and baby, and because it's unclear if vaccination provides any additional benefits for mothers who have acquired immunity through natural infection.
If you can provide any citations to primary sources supporting your claim that vaccination is conclusively recommended I would appreciate it - I'm keeping an open mind here.
[1] https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/recommend...
Your proposition is "a virus many times deadlier then the flu in a target group who have more serious outcomes from anything, what could go wrong?"
And your evidence is: "well for someone who currently has effective natural immunity.."
[1] https://www.health.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/2021...
But that’s not what’s being communicated.
Those of us who got that vaccine first were encouraged to remain in, though, which I did. Though that may change depending on mandate/passport stuff, since for official purposes, I'm still considered unvaccinated. There have been a number of other issues like this that have come up, for example:
https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2021/08/13/vaccine-passp...
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/covid-1...
It really depends on what your definition of “safe” is. The vaccines have stated side effects, some of which can severe. The side effects are relatively rare, but non-zero.
The other component is time. We’ve proven that the vaccine is mostly safe…for at least a year out. After that, we have no data.
You don’t have to look that far back to find things that were deemed safe at one time have disastrous consequences years down the line. Cigarettes, asbestos, etc.
Cigarettes and asbestos are not vaccines and are thus evaluated totally differently (and at a totally different point in time). In past vaccines monitoring, bad things happen right away versus long term:
“Serious side effects that could cause a long-term health problem are extremely unlikely following any vaccination, including COVID-19 vaccination. Vaccine monitoring has historically shown that side effects generally happen within six weeks of receiving a vaccine dose. For this reason, the FDA required each of the authorized COVID-19 vaccines to be studied for at least two months (eight weeks) after the final dose. Millions of people have received COVID-19 vaccines, and no long-term side effects have been detected.” [1]
[1] https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/safety/sa...
Re: things like Tylenol, the difference is we have a ton of long term data on that, and the interactions with things like alcohol or other drugs are well known.
The fact that the FDA made a point to say that the vaccine was studied for eight whole weeks is worrisome, for something that most of the population will be forced or at least coerced into taking.
> Five years after Vioxx's launch, Merck withdrew the drug from the market. By that time, Merck had sold billions of dollars of the drug worldwide.
[1]: https://www.npr.org/2007/11/10/5470430/timeline-the-rise-and...
Great example.
Nothing here is an indictment of vaccines per se. However, it is legitimate to have concerns over a process the rules stated at the outset were thrown out, possibly for personal profit and political motivations.
Also, see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28280087 for a link to an articulate consideration of a number of concerns regarding this approval.
True.
> Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine generated $7.8 billion in revenue in the second quarter[1].
Note that with Pharma, there is a fixed cost up front. After that, the marginal cost is relatively small and every extra dose prints money.
Also, there are people in other countries who are being called back for a fourth dose right now.
[1]: https://www.marketwatch.com/story/pfizers-covid-19-vaccine-g...
There are going to be some people and even large swathes of some countries that are never going to get vaccinated. If everyone took safety and science seriously, there probably would still be a control group in place. There were probably numerous people in the control group that had little to no risk of death nor complications even if they caught the virus and had to be quarantined. Ultimately, the vaccines will never meet the "gold standard" that Fauci and others applied to all other potential treatments.
Also, if vaccines become mandatory, the systems in place to address vaccine damage and liability need to be reformed. The excuse about scary yet isolated incidents having a disproportionate impact on vaccine adoption rates would no longer be valid.
Moderna was approved on December 18, 2020.[0]
Moderna phase 3 trial started on July 27, 2020.[1]
IE, the control group was offered the vaccine more than five months after the trial began. This is before completion of the trial (Oct 2022 for Moderna, IIRC), which is an issue, but this "14 day" as written seems to be suggesting that it was 14 days after the trial began, when it's actually five month.
Additionally, when a treatment proves to be highly effective, it's normal and appropriate to start providing that treatment to the control group early, because leaving them to die or otherwise suffer an illness is considered unethical. This isn't something unique to the COVID vaccines.
[0] https://www.fda.gov/coronavirus-disease-2019-covid-19/modern...
[1] https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-perspective/2020/07/phase-3-...
Moderna was not "approved" on December 18. Your own source says it was "authorized for emergency use".
This is not limited to the medical field, I was once downvoted on an HN comment until I edited it to state that I wasn't supporting Trump, because people were reading it that way.
It's funny you mentioned this because my original comment was something along the lines of:
"""
2016-2020: "I hate Trump, but..."
2021: "I got the vaccine, but..."
"""
But I erased that and wrote my comment above because I thought it had a lower chance of being downvoted.
I think his goal was to make it clear that he was not an anti-science or conspirationist himself.
20 bucks? Cheep! Hopefully this drives up vaccine investment.
From a quick Google, it seems that Phase III trials are about comparing a new treatment to existing alternatives, rather than monitoring side-effects. Perhaps the testing simply can't be complete before 2023, since it involves checking long-term immunity? In this case, the FDA may have approved the vaccine because they are confident that the risk of negative side-effects is sufficiently small, and that the vaccine gives some benefit - even if testing hasn't established exactly how much.
[0]: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jun/28/alzhei...
Also to be fair it's not like they just rushed it out the door. There are probably very few things on the market (short of fully approved pharmaceuticals) that have been through more testing than these "rushed" vaccines.
edit: https://www.fda.gov/vaccines-blood-biologics/vaccines/emerge...
We can do better than guilt by association. It's a very weak argument, and turns more people away from potential vaccination. In fact insulting the remaining audience is worse than preaching to the choir, because it even turns away people who were previously 100% on one's side.
A drug should be approved once it is very likely causing more good than harm. But obviously that doesn't mean you should stop researching that drug.
What's happening here makes perfect sense. We have more than enough information to conclude that it is extremely likely that the vaccine helps a lot and causes little harm. However if there are any rare side effects then we'd still like to know that, therefore it is a good thing that the patients in the trials are still being observed for anything unusual.
Err, that sounds really scary and wrong to me. Seems to me that a drug should be approved when all the side effects are known, results are well characterized among a large sample set over a sufficiently long time frame, and it is determined that the drug is "safe" in the absolute sense.
It may be the case that we are better off taking a vaccine in a pandemic _even though we are not 100% sure it is safe_ due to the opportunity cost, and that's what emergency authorizations are for.
Even if the FDA really did their due diligence here, it will not convince anyone who was not already convinced; it is obvious that they were going to approve it no matter what, because the political fallout of not approving it after so many people have taken it would permanently destroy what trust remains in the US public health system.
How long is sufficient? How large of a test group is sufficient?
In the "absolute" sense, there is no known drug that is safe. That is extremist thinking that only serves to muddy the waters of the actual debate, which should be: "how safe is safe enough?"
> we are not 100% sure it is safe
Note that "100% sure" does not mean "100%" safe. So how much safety do you need a 100% assurance for? How do you quantify the safety?
> that sounds really scary
How does this not just describe life in general? And how does that help policymaking? I don't think our species would have made it to the agricultural revolution if that was the overriding force for anything.
> it will not convince anyone who was not already convinced
This also strikes me as a poor consideration for any policymaker, as they likely know that at the onset to any such policymaking. This adds nothing new or interesting to the debate.
The biggest reason is: J&J's biggest advantage early on was how much cheaper it is. One shot, simpler manufacturing process (which they've screwed up several times anyway, granted), it would be the one to get widely distributed because the cost-per-fully-vaccinated individual is far lower.
The issue is, the government is paying for all this, and they write blank checks. CVS administers a Pfizer/Moderna; insurance or the government refunds (I'm told) $50. They administer a J&J, they get (again, hearsay) $10. Vaccination clinics are actively incentivized to stock the most expensive vaccines, because the profit per vaccine is higher. So, some have stopped stocking J&J (which, coincidentally, is the one vaccine I've heard many anti-vax people say they'd actually consider, as its kinda-sorta-not-really-but-good-enough more traditional. at least one person i've talked to has said 'well, i'd get the J&J, but the closest clinic that has it is 30 minutes away, so i just haven't gotten around to it').
[0]https://www.cms.gov/medicare/covid-19/medicare-covid-19-vacc...
Traditional flu jabs apparently [0] cost the NHS £5-8 (<$11) per dose; the Astrazeneca Covid-19 vaccine seems in-line with that charging $2-5 non-profit for the duration of the pandemic [1]. But I don't know how comparable that is to Pfizer's given that the latter's different, newer (mRNA) tech AIUI? (Perhaps that's a disservice to the researchers at AZ/Oxford, I don't know.)
[0] - https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/01/17/nhs-attempts-sav...
[1] - https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/aug/11/covid-19-vacci...
Pfizer has also been strong arming small, Latin American countries, to the tune of trying to get military assets as "collateral" (https://www.pharmaceutical-technology.com/news/company-news/...)
Weren't extremely generous provisions like that offered by the US government last year in order to jumpstart vaccine development and production ASAP?
Wouldn't this be standard language in any contract? If I buy a widget and they ship it to me, if it gets damaged in transit, or lost in transit I still have to pay the producer, I then go after the delivery company (and/or their insurance) for compensation.
If something arrives (late, if I care) damaged, or not at all, from Amazon or whatever, I tell them and they refund me or ship a replacement.
May I ask why? I've had two shots without much hesitation but this whole booster thing came out of nowhere and gives me "fool me twice" vibes. I understand getting a flu shot every year to target new strains but this would be the exact same shot as 8 months ago.
If you keep a tab on the news you might have seen antibody level from covid vaccines drops significantly over time. Actually same is true for people already have covid; natural protection wanes off within few months.
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/flu-survi...
You are correct the flu shot targets different strains, but the H1N1 strain has been part of the annual flu shot since 2009 simply because it has continued to circulate. So just like you get an H1N1 shot every year (to boost your antibody levels), you will likely get a COVID shot every year to boost those antibodies.
For others, it seems that with Pfizer the antibody level drops over time.
It also shows vaccination is effective, but we don’t know the half life of it.
So the CDCs stance is to vaccinate even if you have a natural immunity, because the vaccine _might_ do better. But that doesn’t seem to naturally follow.
It wouldn’t bother me if companies weren’t considering forcing you to vaccinate to keep your job, even if you have a natural immunity. These stances have real world consequences. You are asking people to trigger their immune system, something complex and not fully understood. Companies are taking these recommendations and using them as policy, forcing the recommendations as corporate laws. If you are going to force this on people, the way you are communicating isn’t how you do it.
What makes you think I have the power to force anyone to anything?! I honestly don't care how I communicate or what you think of what corporations should do. I am personally tired of all these lazy ignorant rants while society is suffering and the medical community is doing their best.
Second, Pfizer’s vaccines in terms of value produced are worth trillions. Even making $10 billion is completely worth it.
In terms of what we as a society should value and pay for, I would rather us pay a lot of money to Pfizer to develop life saving vaccines than 100’s of billions for ads or weapons.
I actually would like for Pfizer to have made even more money than they are making now.
I saw some conspiracy theory that said this weeks ago and just shook my head at how ridiculous that would be. At least it seemed like a conspiracy theory because my view of control group was apparently something else.
Emergency use authorization, for a vaccine that was never tested on humans, and both Pfizer and Moderna eliminated the control groups?
What the hell!? There must be… other or new control groups right? You can’t really have phase3 trials and reference nothing for control can you? What will they reference?
What conspiracy theory?
StatNews[1]:
> Pfizer and BioNTech speed up timeline for offering Covid-19 vaccine to placebo volunteers
> Pfizer and its partner BioNTech plan to offer their Covid-19 vaccine to any clinical trial volunteer who received placebo by March 1, several months earlier than initially planned.
and NPR[2]:
> Long-Term Studies Of COVID-19 Vaccines Hurt By Placebo Recipients Getting Immunized
> Tens of thousands of people who volunteered to be in studies of the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines are still participating in follow-up research. But some key questions won't be easily answered, because many people who had been in the placebo group have now opted to take the vaccine.
[1]: https://www.statnews.com/2021/01/01/pfizer-and-biontech-spee...
[2]: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/02/19/9691430...
Imagine you volunteered for a very experimental trial for the greater good and then were told that you were given a placebo and now cannot receive a vaccine for several years and will have to be more cautious. You can see in the article that a volunteer from the trial is strongly advocating for giving the participants access to vaccines.
Obviously this complicates the statistical analysis (you can try to use a double-blind crossover study to get some statistical power out of this, but clearly the messaging gets more complicated), but I'm not seeing anything about a "14 day" timeline.
It's also worth noting that any study participant can just freely choose to break the study and go in and get vaccinated (lowering the measured efficacy of the vaccine)_whenever they want. Giving them a concrete date is a good alternative to that.
In this specific situation, they would have been condemning through a choice to not treat, a fraction of the control group to die.
At the time they dissolved the control group, the fatality rate in control and placebo were the same. By their very own data they did not have a strong case that they would be "condemning...a fraction of the control group to die.". One would have to make a leap. A plausible leap, but a leap nonetheless.
Let's assume though that the fatality rate across the population for COVID was 1%, a very high number, to be conservative. So in that case you'd expect ~150 preventable fatalities in the control group. We now have ~that many fatalities, in a single state (Massachusetts), from COVID-19, in people who were "fully vaccinated".
You can do the math and extrapolate that there are now orders of magnitude more deaths from "breakthrough infections" than might have been in the placebo control group. If we had known that the efficacy of these vaccines was going to fall significantly, might some of those deaths have been prevented? I think there's an argument to be made there.
Now we have statisticians scrambling over themselves with complex methods to figure out what the hell is going on, when we could have had the gold standard which would be quite simple to interpret, if we had kept those control groups.
Now some argue it would have been completely impractical to maintain that control group amidst a mass vax campaign (I think we should have tried, regardless). I think there's room to debate that. But in that case I think we need a vast upgrade to our data infra, because giving up the placebo control group was a huge loss (for truth and science, at least).
That doesn’t actually seem right though. You have control groups at least through all phases of trials to make sure “the treatment works”. That’s literally the point of the control.
Especially now that we know the vaccines don’t completely work to stop infection or prevent symptoms or spread.
I’m all for the vaccines, but it seems crazy that they didn’t even wait until phase3 was over for a new type that has never been tested on humans before.
If the argument is “the control petiole were at risk”, they should have been told their vaccine was placebo and ask for volunteers to remain in control, seems like flat out offering them real shot defeats the point, doesn’t it?
It seems you can force people to get a vaccine in the middle of a pandemic. France is dealing with massive unrest [0] and are hemorrhaging medical staff [1] because they mandated vaccines for medical professionals (which doesn't make sense, the vaccine doesn't prevent a person from spreading the virus [2]).
[0] https://spectator.org/french-health-pass-riots/
[1] https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/we-have-rights-french-h...
[2] https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2021/08/06/cdc_direc...!
- Phase 3 trials for Pfizer not complete until May 2023: (https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04368728) - Control group(s) were given vaccines after 14 days: (https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/02/19/9691430...) - Pfizer generates 1.9bn in revenue off of 100m doses, just in the USA alone, creating a massive revenue loop for them that governments cannot get out of due to predatory contracts (https://www.fiercepharma.com/pharma/pfizer-eyes-higher-covid...) - Pfizer's incredibly predatory, leaked, contract (https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/20616251-albanian-pf...)