Oxford Vaccine Could Substantially Cut Spread
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on the BBC.
This is the first two paragraphs.
The Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine could lead to a “substantial” fall in the spread of the virus, say scientists.
The impact of Covid vaccines on transmission has been a crucial unknown that will dramatically shape the future of the pandemic.
The article also says you get this after one dose.
This study – on 17,000 people in the UK, South Africa and Brazil – showed protection remained at 76% during the three months after the first dose.
This rose to 82% after people were given the second dose.
It will be interesting to see, what figures drop out of the data, when millions have been vaccinated twice in the UK.
Conclusion
It looks like very good news to me!
Is This The Proof That Coeliacs On A Gluten-Free Diet Don’t Get The Covids?
I took this picture in Marks and Spencer’s food store on Finsbury Pavement this morning,
I know Easter is coming, but it did seem to me that they had over-ordered the gluten-free hot cross buns.
But have their gluten-free sales held up extremely well during the pandemic?
Are their large numbers of gluten-free customers, still well enough to be buying the good things in life?
Certainly, throughout the pandemic, there’s never been a shortage of gluten-free scones!
Or it could be a simple case of a computer saying “Let them eat loadsa buns!” in the City of London!
Is Whitechapel Station Emerging From Its Shell?
I took these pictures this morning at Whitechapel station, this morning.
I have broken them into sections.
The Overground Platforms
There is work to do, but they are certainly useable and safe for passengers.
Overground To Sub-Surface Lines
What an elegant way to hide the structure, that holds everything up!
Whitechapel Road
My granddaughter was born in the old Royal London Hospital.
Sub-Surface Platforms
The detail of the lights and the various platform fittings looks good.
Whitechapel Station In 3D
This Google Map shows a 3D image of the station.
It’s one of those sites, where you’d choose somewhere else.
Crossrail’s Progress Video From February 2020
Conclusion
The builders seem to be getting towards the final stages.
As they have a lot of testing to do, I suspect the earliest day for trains to be running through with passengers, would be sometime in November 2021,
The Jabbers Hit The Jabpot!
It has been announced that yesterday a total of 609,050 does of the vaccine were administered.
It is an incredible figure, made up of 598389 first and 10661 second jabs.
It really was a Super Jabba Saturday, with one report on the BBC, saying that in one vaccination centre in Newcastle, 2,000 people were vaccinated.
If the reported 1,400 vaccination centres around the UK, hit two thousand per day, that is 2.8 million jabs per day and we could vaccinate sixty million people twice in just 43 days. Probably, this is an unachievable time, as not all centres could handle 2000 jabs per day.
I think we’re in for a very statistically interesting few days, as the vaccinators find a level that is at equilibrium with the population and their determination to get vaccinated or not!
I feel, that vaccine supply permitting, the daily number for jabs will be around the psychologically important 500,000.
Mon Dieu! Le Soleil A Volé Notre Titre
The Sun today has a headline of Brexit 1 – Brussels 0!
The title of this post, is possibly the reaction of the editor of the leading French newspaper; Le Figaro, that according to Andrew Marr, used the headline first.
Covid: What’s Happening To The EU Vaccine Scheme?
The title of this post is the same as that of this article on the BBC.
These are the introductory paragraphs.
The European Union has been criticised for the slow pace of coronavirus vaccinations in member states.
It has introduced export controls on vaccines produced in the EU after the roll-out was hit by delays and supply problems.
The delays and supply problems seem to concern the AstraZeneca plant in Belgium. Get that running flat out would surely help to solve the problem.
Wikipedia has an interesting statement under Production and Supply for the AZ vaccine, in the Wikipedia entry for the vaccine.
On 13 June 2020, AstraZeneca signed a contract with the Inclusive Vaccines Alliance, a group formed by France, Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands, to supply up to 400 million doses to all European Union member states. However, the European Commission intervened to stop the deal being formalised. It took over negotiations on behalf of the whole EU, signing a deal at the end of August.
It looks to me that the EU strangled a deal that could have saved their bacon, if Wikipedia is correct.
- Did the delay mean that AstraZeneca delayed completing their European factories, as they were worried about getting any order at all?
- Sometimes, it is difficult financing firm orders, let alone ones that might be cancelled at the whim of politicians.
- Was Macron hoping the French vaccine was coming through and so could replace the AstraZeneca vaccine? But it didn’t appear, so the EU had to go cap-in-hand to AstraZeneca, who now had the problem of getting the equipment from suppliers, they’d mucked about.
It looks to me like an almighty coq-up!
The section about the Oxford vaccine in Wikipedia, also says that the vaccine has been licenced to the US, Argentina for Latin America and India and that production from the UK and EU factories will be between 100 and 200 million doses per month, when up to full speed.
Those production figures look like they could satisfy the UK’s order for 100 million doses and 400 million for the EU, if AstraZeneca can get the Belgian plant fully working.
I wouldn’t be surprised to see a solution something like this.
- Novavax gets UK certification very soon.
- Novavax starts supplying doses to the UK, in perhaps March.
- AstraZeneca sends some UK vaccine to the EU, with Novavax keeping the vaccination rate high.
- AstraZeneca gets their EU factories up to speed in something like June.
- The EU gets its vaccines and is now able to vaccinate at a vaguely acceptable rate if they get their systems right.
- Moderna comes on stream around the middle of the year.
- The UK has adequate deliveries of AstraZeneca, Moderna, Novavax and Pfizer vaccines and starts mass vaccination for everyone, around the start of September.
If the EU had allowed the original deal to proceed for EU vaccines, the timescales would probably be have been three months earlier.
Conclusion
The EU will get its vaccines, but later than if they’d placed their orders at the same time as the UK did.
Macron Rex: Interfuctus Est.
The title of this post, is a tagline in the big cartoon in today’s copy of The Times.
It is drawn in the style of the Bayeux Tapestry and has all the players in our spat with the EU.
Many have been shot by syringes.
Does President Macro have a sense of humour?
Try to see a copy and examine the detail!
The Voice’s Tom Jones, 80, Feels ‘Bulletproof’ After Second Covid Vaccine
The title of this post is the same as that as this article on the Metro.
The title says it all and surely Tom Jones is the type of celebrity, who could encourage others to have the jab.
A Way Out Of The AstraZeneca Vaccine Row With The EU
This article on the BBC is entitled Brexit: EU Introduces Controls On Vaccines To NI.
These are the introductory paragraphs of the article.
The EU is introducing controls on vaccines made in the bloc, including to Northern Ireland, amid a row about delivery shortfalls.
Under the Brexit deal, all products should be exported from the EU to Northern Ireland without checks.
But the EU believed this could be used to circumvent export controls, with NI becoming a backdoor to the wider UK.
The row involving AstraZeneca, the UK and the EU is now getting serious,
I think, the EU are missing an opportunity.
My Experience Of The AstraZeneca Vaccine
Yesterday, I received my first dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine, which I wrote about in Job Done – I’ve Now Had My First Covid-19 Vaccination.
As I am an engineer, who helped to finance a drug-delivery system, I know a bit about the subject of drug delivery.
My jab yesterday seemed to have been administered very quickly and painlessly, without fuss. I regularly have B12 injections as I’m coeliac and this AstraZeneca one was certainly less painful for me.
Have AstraZeneca designed the vaccine and its delivery system so that it will have application in mass vaccination situations like refugee camps, where thousands may need to be vaccinated quickly?
Consider.
- It can be transported and stored at easy-to-manage temperatures.
- I suspect that a skilled vaccinator can vaccinate more patients per hour, than with other vaccines.
- I didn’t feel a thing, which must help those with needle phobia.
- The vaccinator didn’t need to apply a plaster, just using a cotton wool pad and pressure. This must save time.
This looks to me, like disruptive innovation is at work.
Surely, though by streamlining the vaccination process, this will increase the number of patients vaccinated by a well-trained team. This will be what doctors ordered.
The Real Problem With The AstraZeneca Vaccine
I have worked a lot in the design of project management systems and very often, when projects go awry, it is due to a lack of resources.
It strikes me that the problem with the AstraZeneca vaccine, is that there are not enough factories to make the vaccine.
As it is easier to distribute and AstraZeneca are making it without profit, perhaps the EU should approach the UK about creating a couple of large factories to make the vaccine in suitable places across the UK and the EU.
A proportion of this increased production could be distributed to countries, that couldn’t afford a commercial vaccine or didn’t want to get ensnared by the Chinese in a Vaccines-for-Resources deal.
It should also be remembered that Oxford are at the last stages in the testing of a vaccine for malaria. That would surely be a superb encore for Oxford University and AstraZeneca. I suspect the UK will back it, but it would surely be better, if the EU backed it as well.
Covid-19 Vaccination On The Island Of Ireland
Every day, The Times publishes a table of how many people in various countries have been vaccinated against the Covids.
Today’s figures included.
- UK – 11 %
- Ireland – 3 %
Out of curiosity, I calculated today’s figure for Northern Ireland. It was 10.4 %.
As the people of Ireland form a rich pattern of families, commerce and employment on both sides of the border, will these figures cause tensions in the Republic?
The Anonymous Widower 