Coronavirus
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Perhaps we can wonder what members thought about having to obey the blackout laws during WW2. Self-protection?
“So guess which the government is ordering most of? That’s right, the cheapest. Which happens to be the 70% one.”
This is inaccurate on several levels. Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine doses (the 70%) were pre-purchased before any results at all were in. In fact, governments have been pre-buying multiple vaccines in gigantic quantities (ie not skimping on costs) in order to be first in the queue, before any results were known. Second, the Oxford vaccine can be stored in a normal refrigerator for 3 months, as opposed to minus-70C as first reported for Pfizer (though this might not now be correct) or Moderna at minus-20C, making it the most practical especially for poor and hot countries. Third, comments here have overlooked the interim nature of the results. The Oxford Phase 3 trials also included a sub-group where they tried giving subjects only half a dose to see what would happen, and found that effectiveness then jumped to 90%, a counter-intuitive result they are investigating further, see: https://www.newscientist.com/article/2260588-oxford-astrazeneca-covid-19-vaccine-may-be-up-to-90-per-cent-effective/.
This is a very fast-moving field and drawing any firm conclusions at this stage is risky. We don’t want to fall into the facile trap of blaming everything bad on capitalism, and reading the very worst motives into every situation, because if we do that we could come off as ill-informed truculent finger-pointers, rather than people whose conclusions ought to be taken seriously.
Robin said “How do we get round this dilemma?” (ie of opposing authority yet appearing to side with the government on Covid). I don’t think there is any dilemma. Sometimes, inevitably, the interests of government and working class may coincide, as for instance with the establishment of the welfare state in 1948. Should socialists have opposed the welfare state because it suited the interests of big business, even though it probably added 20 years to the lifespan of the average worker? That would be a nonsensical and indeed anti-working-class position to take. The fact that government-imposed restrictions coincide with the scientific evidence and with the health interest of the working class creates no dilemma for us and does not require any kind of special pleading. The pandemic is a highly unusual situation that can’t be understood through the normal workings of capitalism.
December Pathfinders also looks at some of these issues.
“Having said which…’the birth of a biosecurity state guaranteed to mean the loss of civil liberties, wholesale’. Eh what? Was the email to HO from a party member?”
No, from somebody whose mailing we happen to be on.
It looks as if there has been some manipulation of the data in the Oxford vaccine. This won’t be the fault of the dedicated researchers or the public-spirited volunteers but someone higher up, such as a non-scientists more concerned with beating the competition or getting a bigger slice of the market. It’s capitalism’s reverse Midas touch again — everything it touches turns to shit.
Anyway, the shareholders are being punished. According to the Financial Times in an article headed “Doubts raised over AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine data”:
“Markets have taken notice. London-listed shares in AstraZeneca have lost more than 6 per cent since the announcement. By comparison, since trial results from their vaccine were released earlier this month, showing an effectiveness of 90 per cent, shares in Pfizer and BioNTech have gained 6 per cent and 14 per cent respectively; Moderna is up 11 per cent since its vaccine trial data came out, on top of big gains in the run-up to publication.
One early critic this week, Geoffrey Porges, an analyst at SVB Leerink, said he thought it was unlikely the AstraZeneca jab would get approval in the US after the company “tried to embellish their results” by highlighting higher efficacy in a “relatively small subset of subjects in the study”. John LaMattina, a former president of Pfizer’s global research and development unit, wrote on Twitter that it was “hard to believe” US regulators would issue an emergency-use authorisation for a “vaccine whose optimal dose has only been given to 2,300 people”. Much of the confusion stems from Oxford and AstraZeneca not being fully forthcoming on the reason for the two different dosing regimens — which changed unexpectedly as trials progressed.”I recall the conspiracists a few years ago reporting FEMA concentration camps were being set up across America. Now they report that compulsory quarantine camps are being established. One of many web-sites you can find
I don’t think there is any dilemma. Sometimes, inevitably, the interests of government and working class may coincide, as for instance with the establishment of the welfare state in 1948. Should socialists have opposed the welfare state because it suited the interests of big business, even though it probably added 20 years to the lifespan of the average worker? That would be a nonsensical and indeed anti-working-class position to take.
PJS,
Like your comment… it does raise the notion of reform to protect the working class health interests over reformism (impossible for capital to reform its self interest).
We all deserve to stay safe, bugger the costs!
Perhaps we can put an end to the narrative of financial ‘health burden’- look your customers need to stay alive… sounds really morbid.
No money: no deficit.
hope you are safe,
L.B.
Business trips to be exempt from quarantine
Quarantine rules to be relaxed for business travellers – BBC News
Performing arts workers, TV production staff, journalists and recently signed sports professionals will also be exempt
And churches are allowed too according to the supreme court based on the so-called freedom of religion, but it was the same court which approved the Muslim ban
Sweden, the darling of the anti-lockdown campaigners, re-evaluates its policies.
Swedes’ support for anti-lockdown stance slips amid rising Covid deaths | World news | The Guardian
confidence in authorities’ capacity to control the crisis had fallen sharply to 42% from 55% in October, while 44% of respondents said they felt not enough was being done to fight Covid-19, up from 31% the previous month. More than 80% of those surveyed said they were either “somewhat” or “very worried” that Sweden’s health service would not be able to cope
high schools will switch to distance learning for rest of term…Sweden last month introduced tougher restrictions, cutting its limit on attendance at public gatherings to eight people and announcing that bars and restaurants would not be allowed to serve alcohol after 10pm until the end of February.
400,000 people a year die of malaria, and in Africa a child under five dies every two minutes.
A vaccine has been developed yet the final trials are just beginning and it will be 2024 before it will be authorised.
No fast tracking for the poor such as with the Covid-19 vaccine.
Team behind Oxford Covid jab start final stage of malaria vaccine trials | World news | The Guardian
In principle I am not against the idea of being vaccinated but the current vaccines being hyped and pushed on the public dont fill me with a great deal of confidence. Amongst other things the fact that Big Pharma is exempted from liability is extremely worrying and gives the green light for overhasty and inadequately trialled vaccines – particularly given the competitive pressure on companies to win the race to produce a vaccine
I saw on France 24 TV channel that 60% of the French public say they will not submit to being vaccinated with concern over possible side effects being cited as a major reason. I wont be rushing to get vaccinated either but will stick with the normal preventive measures such as social distancing and mask wearing
This link raises some interesting issues surrounding the proposed vaccination programme
The exemption from liability is a long-standing standard procedure, Robin.
Most countries have a government administered no-fault compensation scheme for adverse effects of immunisation.
UK to cover COVID-19 vaccine side-effects under damages scheme, World News | wionews.com
That is, however, not immunity from illegal acts such as criminal negligence and that would still apply if any Big Pharma corporation was proved faking or making fraudulent safety claims that resulted in injury or death.
My real concern is that the roll-out of vaccination programmes will favour the wealthy nations and many of the world’s poor will be excluded from its benefits for quite some time in the future.
I foresee that there will be stringent travel restrictions imposed upon those not vaccinated, and indeed we will see a situation that we will have to have proof of vaccination.
In my travels in my youth, i was required to have a NHS-issued international card declaring i was innoculated against yellow fever so it isn’t something new.
I have just checked with an old UK passport I had and see I had travel documents saying that I have been vaccinated against cholera, yellow fever and smallpox. But they are no longer valid. The cholera one was only for 6 months, the smallpox for 3 years and the yellow fever for 6 years.
So it is feasible that they could do this for COVID-19 but I don’t think they know yet how long immunity will last or whether being vaccinated will mean you can’t be a carrier again.
Given the choice between cholera, yellow fever, smallpox and COVID-19 I think I will vote for the least evil and plump for Covid-19.
“I don’t think they know yet how long immunity will last or whether being vaccinated will mean you can’t be a carrier again.”
Yes, only time will tell and you can’t fast-track that.
The other unknown is whether the vaccines work at the advertised effectiveness for older people, whose immune systems are weaker and therefore don’t respond to vaccines as well as young people’s. Most of the volunteers in the trials have been low-risk people under 40 and none of the trials have provided age-breakdowns. The predictable anti-vaxxer concern about side effects is to my mind a much lesser consideration for older people than whether the vaccines will even work. If you take a vaccine on the assumption it’s going to work, you are likely to relax your guard, which could get you into big trouble. But on balance I would say that if you’re offered a vaccine you’d be taking a bigger risk by refusing it than by accepting it. And of course there is the argument of social responsibility…
From having no vaccine we now have several, with each state saying its one is the one. How are we to gauge this, except by knowing that we are all test subjects and must grit our teeth and hope not to be injured in the long term? This is about money and nationalism. What’s the Russian vaccine story, and how can there now be several vaccines, all different?
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