Thailand has contingency plans to secure COVID-19 vaccines

[Bkk Brian]

2 minutes ago, Scouse123 said:

 

Your quotes are from six days ago and this is a rapidly changing situation , mine was from information available yesterday.

 

I understand your quotes and I am not trying to score points, it just seems my link is more recent.

 

 

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/02/08/uk-expert-no-reason-to-think-south-africa-variant-will-be-dominant.html

Yes things do change quickly and the numbers found are going up quickly

 

This from the BBC 2 hours ago https://www.bbc.com/news/explainers-54872039

 

"At least 147 cases of the strain have been identified in the UK but it's "very possible" it has spread far more widely, experts have said.

 

It is "critical" that people stay at home in areas where mass testing for the South African Covid variant is taking place, the government says.

Covid: Which areas are being mass tested for the South Africa variant?"

[hotchilli]

18 hours ago, webfact said:

Thailand has contingency plans

 

[Guderian]

18 hours ago, webfact said:

still looking to seal deals with other vaccine manufacturers.

 

That's Thai for, "Let's see how thick the brown envelopes you're offering me are."

[pseudorabies]

7 hours ago, cdemundo said:

Maybe my question was not clear.  I was wondering where you got the information that Covid virus mutation to becoming harmless was "inevitable"?

As you say the process of mutation itself is entirely random so why would it be "inevitable" that it would mutate to become harmless.

 

I am not interested in a peeing contest about this, just asking a simple question: what is your source for the information that mutating to a harmless variant is inevitable?

It's based on the idea that a chronic infection that gives maximum opportunity to spread (reproduce) is in the virus's best interest and that killing the host is not.  In my mind an excellent example of this is herpes viruses and how they have evolved to not invade the natural host's central nervous system but to reside just outside, usually in a latent state, in the nerve clusters just outside of the spinal cord (sensory ganglia).  If introduced into a non-natural host, for example monkey B virus into humans, the mechanism that the virus evolved to keep out of monkey's brains doesn't work and the infected person goes on to develop a fatal encephalitis. Reproductive dead-end (literally) for the virus.

 

You could argue that COVID/SARS-CoV2 is already there since it infects most people without causing symptoms but is still capable of spreading from those people.

[George Aylesham]

18 hours ago, FarFlungFalang said:

Looks like he's relied on a sole supplier and it fell through so now he's not relying on a sole supplier.

At least two - Oxford Astra Zenca and Sinovac.

[Mike Rodik]

government being lazy, might not be a bad thing after all ????

[cdemundo]

19 minutes ago, pseudorabies said:

It's based on the idea that a chronic infection that gives maximum opportunity to spread (reproduce) is in the virus's best interest and that killing the host is not.  In my mind an excellent example of this is herpes viruses and how they have evolved to not invade the natural host's central nervous system but to reside just outside, usually in a latent state, in the nerve clusters just outside of the spinal cord (sensory ganglia).  If introduced into a non-natural host, for example monkey B virus into humans, the mechanism that the virus evolved to keep out of monkey's brains doesn't work and the infected person goes on to develop a fatal encephalitis. Reproductive dead-end (literally) for the virus.

 

You could argue that COVID/SARS-CoV2 is already there since it infects most people without causing symptoms but is still capable of spreading from those people.

I understand what you have said.  But it does not imply that mutation to harmlessness is inevitable.  Mutations occur randomly and do not occur to serve the best interest of the virus, so that does not seem to be an argument that implies harmlessness is inevitable.  Clearly killing the host before it can facilitate transmission of the virus would lead to the extinction of the virus, but many viruses persist on the long continuum between killing the host too quickly and and being harmless.  

"You could argue that COVID/SARS-CoV2 is already there since it infects most people without causing symptoms but is still capable of spreading from those people."  The statement in question was that it was inevitable that it would mutate to become harmless;  the virus in all its current variants is far from harmless.

[robert888d]

It is late considering the millions already vaccinated in a huge number of other countries Europe,UK, USA,,Canada,China  India,Brazil , Indonesia  etc etc I think Thailand  hopes to begin vaccination in June  months away. 

[Phaser]

Thailand bet on the wrong horse - and apparently the vest interests won’t allow it to change horses mid stream 

 

Thailand please approve the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines - they are clearly the best and forget about your AstraZeneca deal

[John Drake]

10 minutes ago, Phaser said:

Thailand bet on the wrong horse - and apparently the vest interests won’t allow it to change horses mid stream 

 

Thailand please approve the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines - they are clearly the best and forget about your AstraZeneca deal

 

And possibly the Sputnik vaccine. The  two they've chosen, unfortunately, are duds.

[Mywayboy]

Another Thai contingency plan ready to go A up

[Cake Monster]

2 hours ago, Guderian said:

 

That's Thai for, "Let's see how thick the brown envelopes you're offering me are."

Or it could be ' Lets sell our Ar22 to the CCP if we need too.

All the Thai hope for Vaccines seems to be with the AZ / SB partnership but unless AZ can actually supply from some of their other Globally sited Facilities, Thailand is going to have a long wait.

The SB facility in Thailand is neither built, equipped or staffed to produce any Vaccine, and is unlikely to be so until at least June.

[Chongalulu]

21 hours ago, keith101 said:

This vaccine has been rendered pretty much useless against the new variants especially the South African one where its only helpful against very mild cases . If this gets into Thailand then they should maybe forget about their order 

Doubt there’ll be a more ill informed comment on this today 

[SwampyThai]

Mmmmm???????? you may be onto something, use Chinese characters to list contingency plans, that would give appropriately 20,000 new contingency plans, should last until at least mid April ????????

[SunsetT]

21 hours ago, GroveHillWanderer said:

there's still protection in that case against deaths, hospitalisations and severe disease.

Which is what is required. In fact it may not be a bad thing that some/many people still get a mild form of the disease as this could boost their own future immunity and help a country and the World eventually achieve herd immunity against the virus.

[chilly07]

4 hours ago, wombat said:

just like SARS did....
i agree with you 100%

Isn't Wuflu SARS Covid 2?

[newnative]

Another day, another explanation, just as unbelievable as all the others.  Jabber, jabber, jabber.  

[Chiang Mai Bill]

23 hours ago, keith101 said:

This vaccine has been rendered pretty much useless against the new variants especially the South African one where its only helpful against very mild cases . If this gets into Thailand then they should maybe forget about their order 

Well, after recent tests (announced yesterday) the AstraZenica vaccine has been proven to protect against the new strains to a degree where those vaccinated will suffer a milder infection that, in the majority of cases, would not need hospitalisation. That is not ''useless''!

 

I'd feel safer having it than not having it!  And it would be a foolish man to suggest that the other vaccines will protect against all the variants that are now circulating!  Viruses ''will'' mutate -- that is inevitable.

 

Perhaps sceptics will refuse any vaccine available now -- or in the future -- because they ''may'' not give 100% protection of future mutations now or in the future?

[placnx]

23 hours ago, GroveHillWanderer said:

It's actually pretty much the opposite of what you said. The Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine still provides good efficacy against all the variants other than the South African one and even for the SA variant where its efficacy is lower it still provides protection against severe illness, hospitalisation or death. It's only against mild cases that it is not so effective.

 

See report below where it is stated, in relation to the AstraZeneca vaccine (and others):

 

"What that is looking like is that we may not be reducing the total number of cases but there's still protection in that case against deaths, hospitalisations and severe disease."

 

BBC News

Oxford-AstraZeneca said that they're working on an update. So will Thailand get to produce the updated version of their vaccine. It should be feasible.

 

Reducing hospitalisations is a worthy outcome, but it's really important to stop the transmission, since the more the spread, the more dangerous variants might emerge. Then we might be back to square one.

 

Hopefully the US and others will arrive at the conclusion that they have to greatly expand production capacity for vaccines such as mRNA types that can more rapidly be adapted to new variants so that people can be vaccinated or boosted proactively. For the US, 300mn booster doses available in a month or so would be a game changer. This productive capacity would then be available for the Third World in particular.

[placnx]

23 hours ago, EricTh said:

 

Modifying any vaccine means they have to start all the phases of clinical trials again which may take another one year.

 

It's not like Windows update when you can just download without any human trials. What may work in the past may not work now and vice versa.

 

Actually the public health people in the US have already said that verifying updates to vaccines will only take weeks. This refers to mRNA vaccines, at least. It's another matter for traditional vaccines such as the Chinese ones.

[placnx]

23 hours ago, GroveHillWanderer said:

Dont forget, what they're doing is taking a vaccine with a genetic sequence of 38,000 characters at its core and replacing just a handful of those characters (17 in the case of the SA variant, IIRC). The outer part of the vaccine (the lipid membrane) for instance, will be totally unaltered.

You're mixing up the vaccine with the genetic sequence of the virus. The vaccine only contains snippets of the viral sequence.

[placnx]

15 hours ago, cdemundo said:

Is this true?  I have never heard this.  I would think that a harmless variant would quickly disappear and the more harmful (or at least more infectious) would continue to spread.  What is your source of this statement?

This may be true for some viruses. The relative infectiousness of a variant would seem to be the determinant. 

[placnx]

6 hours ago, pseudorabies said:

It's based on the idea that a chronic infection that gives maximum opportunity to spread (reproduce) is in the virus's best interest and that killing the host is not.

Actually, Covid doesn't kill that many of the people who are infected. It has a long way to go before the mortality rate rose so much that it would cause the virus to be selected for less harm or to simply disappear.

[sandyf]

On 2/8/2021 at 3:39 PM, FarFlungFalang said:

Looks like he's relied on a sole supplier and it fell through so now he's not relying on a sole supplier.

Early doors the UK backed 7 different horses in the vaccine race.

Only the delusional would think that Thailand has that sort of stake money. The EU are complaining about deliveries from AZ and they were 3 months behind the UK, do you think Thailand should take a leaf out of the EU.s book.

It is a fact of life that manufacturers are always over optimistic about production output and customers have to deal with the fallout as they see fit.

 

[KhaoYai]

On 2/8/2021 at 8:21 AM, keith101 said:

This vaccine has been rendered pretty much useless against the new variants especially the South African one where its only helpful against very mild cases . If this gets into Thailand then they should maybe forget about their order 

Unfounded comment and you got it the wrong way around.  A small study has indicated that it is not very effective at preventing mild symptoms of the South African variant. It seems however, that it does prevent severe symptoms and death - hardly useless. 

 

https://www.ft.com/content/e9bbd4fe-e6bf-4383-bfd3-be64140a3f36

 

It is effective against the 'Kent Variant' in the UK.

 

https://news.sky.com/story/covid-19-oxford-astrazenica-vaccine-has-similar-effect-against-kent-variant-researchers-find-12209449

 

Don't be such a doom a gloom merchant.

 

It has been known since the beginning that the Covid 19 virus will mutate - all vaccine manufacturers will be constantly modifying their vaccines to keep up with the resultant variants.

 

Would you rather there was no vaccine at all?

[KhaoYai]

18 hours ago, dcnx said:

The flu still kills between 300k - 600k people per year globally. How long has the flu been around?

That's not the full story is it?  The flu rarely kills people who are otherwise fit and healthy. That is not to say that they aren't entitled to live but this is 2021 nor 3021 - there are still many killer diseases around.

[connda]

On 2/8/2021 at 3:39 PM, FarFlungFalang said:

Looks like he's relied on a sole supplier and it fell through so now he's not relying on a sole supplier.

But perhaps the sole supplier would prefer that Prayut only relies on the sole supplier.
Then what can he do?  Well, exactly what he's doing right now.  ????  <laughs>

"Err, we are looking and making plans and investigating and attending meetings and discussing and looking into other possiblities.  Don't worry we're doing a wonderful job, now move along. Move along.  Nothing to see here."

[PeeJayEm]

On 2/8/2021 at 3:21 PM, keith101 said:

This vaccine has been rendered pretty much useless against the new variants especially the South African one where its only helpful against very mild cases . If this gets into Thailand then they should maybe forget about their order 

This comment is completely inaccurate. Typical fake and wrongly informing news.

Research in SA shows that the virus is NOT strong in preventing minor cases but IS strong in preventing hospitalisation and death.

 

Why do people put out this sort of fake news garbage?

 

[Bkk Brian]

5 hours ago, PeeJayEm said:

This comment is completely inaccurate. Typical fake and wrongly informing news.

Research in SA shows that the virus is NOT strong in preventing minor cases but IS strong in preventing hospitalisation and death.

The jury is still out on that, more studies needed:

 

Astrazeneca. South African trial of the vaccine, conducted in about 2000 people, found such a low efficacy against mild and moderate disease, under 25%, that it would not meet minimal international standards for emergency use. But scientists are hopeful it might still prevent severe disease and death—arguably the most important job for any COVID-19 vaccine. That was impossible to tell from this placebo-controlled trial because it was small and recruited relatively healthy, young people

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2021/02/south-africa-suspends-use-astrazenecas-covid-19-vaccine-after-it-fails-clearly-stop