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Come on Sarah

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A name probably none of us would have heard of 2 weeks ago, Sarah Gilbert, could be about to change history, should her vaccine work. Human trials start on Thursday. I for one will be praying that she becomes one of the most famous people in modern history.

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5 minutes ago, Well b back said:

A name probably none of us would have heard of 2 weeks ago, Sarah Gilbert, could be about to change history, should her vaccine work. Human trials start on Thursday. I for one will be praying that she becomes one of the most famous people in modern history.

Seconded👍

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Some hope in dark times. Come on girl👍

So much work going on in the U.K. and all over the world to find a vaccine, we’ll get there.

Edited by Van wink

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On 21/04/2020 at 22:41, Well b back said:

A name probably none of us would have heard of 2 weeks ago, Sarah Gilbert, could be about to change history, should her vaccine work. Human trials start on Thursday. I for one will be praying that she becomes one of the most famous people in modern history.

Sarah Gilbert studied at the UEA. By a perverse kind of symmetry so did the scientist - 'Doctor Germ' - who was a key figure in developing Saddam Hussein's biological weapons programme.

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She was confident many weeks ago and it struck me that her enthusiasm as very odd as a scientist (who arguably tend to be on the cautious side) but it was encouraging and very inspiring to hear her thoughts. She was on R4 news this morning and she is hoping to test up to 5000 and get 30 'live' cases as a workable sample.

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Agree with sonyc.

Scientists, like (medical  docs, rarely get publicly excited about anything-its worse case scenario first and work your way up from there. They always deliberately water down optimism of course and that's no bad thing, but, even so, there does seem to be a lot latent optimism re.this vaccine-reason for hope...

Good luck Sarah. May you soon be a household name all over the world.

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4 hours ago, nutty nigel said:

No, you're thinking about Eileen...

Well diverted Nuttyo, this could have got Smuttyo. 

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Being a type 2 diabetic I am keeping an eye on any developments with this vaccine. Of course there will not be to much official information over the next few weeks ( unless it fails ). Being reported today however are 2 unofficial things and at the weekend 1 official thing that had to be reported due to fake information spread on Facebook coming from America, allegedly from those who disapprove of giving vaccines.

So the official news is that the first two volunteers are still alive and well despite the reports that one of them had died, what idiots would write such things ?

Now for the 2 promising bits of information, but of course not official

1. It is reported that American scientists were given samples of the vaccine and injected 6 rehsus monkies. They and several others were then exposed to high levels of the virus. They all caught it except the 6 with the vaccine. I hope this right, but of course as Ricardo will vouch the Americans have had a tendency to exaggerate some of these results, so we will see.

2. It is also being reported that if this ( or any similar vaccine ) are proven to work, September could really be possible as nobody had allowed for one important thing ‘ that governments will actually work together ‘. 
 

Until official things come out I am afraid we can only hope these reports are true.

I will keep an eye on Jenner Institute press releases each day on their official site and put updates on here if I see anything exciting.

’ Come on Sarah ‘

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My last post is now being largely reported by the likes of the New York Times. It is also ( again one has to assume unofficially ) that


On Monday, the world's largest vaccine maker, the Serum Institute of India, said it would not wait for the trial to end and was preemptively making 40 million doses to save time in case it worked.

Thats a lot of money to throw down the drain if they have doubts.

It also seems to show that this is not just being left to the Jenner Institute but spread throughout the world.

Come on Sarah

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15 minutes ago, Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Man said:

I never knew we had such an audience 😉

Lol

I just pray this really works.

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3 hours ago, Well b back said:

Being a type 2 diabetic I am keeping an eye on any developments with this vaccine. Of course there will not be to much official information over the next few weeks ( unless it fails ). Being reported today however are 2 unofficial things and at the weekend 1 official thing that had to be reported due to fake information spread on Facebook coming from America, allegedly from those who disapprove of giving vaccines.

So the official news is that the first two volunteers are still alive and well despite the reports that one of them had died, what idiots would write such things ?

Now for the 2 promising bits of information, but of course not official

1. It is reported that American scientists were given samples of the vaccine and injected 6 rehsus monkies. They and several others were then exposed to high levels of the virus. They all caught it except the 6 with the vaccine. I hope this right, but of course as Ricardo will vouch the Americans have had a tendency to exaggerate some of these results, so we will see.

2. It is also being reported that if this ( or any similar vaccine ) are proven to work, September could really be possible as nobody had allowed for one important thing ‘ that governments will actually work together ‘. 
 

Until official things come out I am afraid we can only hope these reports are true.

I will keep an eye on Jenner Institute press releases each day on their official site and put updates on here if I see anything exciting.

’ Come on Sarah ‘

Along with everybody else, I certainly hope that this works - but a note of caution,although rhesus monkeys have many similarities to humans, I was reading that vaccines have been tested on them before and have appeared to work but did not work when it came to human trials.

I'm not sure that this particular example is anything to do with governments working together, I thought I read that Oxford got off to a flier because they had already done very similar work and had samples etc available. 

Anyway, whatever the reasons, I have confidence that a viable vaccine will be developed soon. 

 

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6 minutes ago, Mark .Y. said:

Along with everybody else, I certainly hope that this works - but a note of caution,although rhesus monkeys have many similarities to humans, I was reading that vaccines have been tested on them before and have appeared to work but did not work when it came to human trials.

I'm not sure that this particular example is anything to do with governments working together, I thought I read that Oxford got off to a flier because they had already done very similar work and had samples etc available. 

Anyway, whatever the reasons, I have confidence that a viable vaccine will be developed soon. 

 

It’s the actual bit that the vaccine is being passed to other countries, who are being allowed to develop it. As I understand it the reason we were looking at 12 - 18 months was the length of time it would take to mass produce the vaccine. Those barriers ( certainly with this vaccine ) if reports are true have broken that myth, with India already commencing mass production, USA and some African companies being given the vaccine. Like you I appreciate often these things don’t work, but my cause for optimism is that scientists are usually very cautious and lean towards the bad side, but in this instance they are being unusually optimistic. 

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3 minutes ago, Well b back said:

It’s the actual bit that the vaccine is being passed to other countries, who are being allowed to develop it. As I understand it the reason we were looking at 12 - 18 months was the length of time it would take to mass produce the vaccine. Those barriers ( certainly with this vaccine ) if reports are true have broken that myth, with India already commencing mass production, USA and some African companies being given the vaccine. Like you I appreciate often these things don’t work, but my cause for optimism is that scientists are usually very cautious and lean towards the bad side, but in this instance they are being unusually optimistic. 

Ah, sorry, you meant governments working together for mass producing the vaccine. I thought you meant just the development of it, which appears to be down to Oxford alone, and is at the testing stage.

 

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23 minutes ago, Mark .Y. said:

Ah, sorry, you meant governments working together for mass producing the vaccine. I thought you meant just the development of it, which appears to be down to Oxford alone, and is at the testing stage.

 

Yep sorry. It was assumed even by WHO that if something broke through that country would make political decisions, that seems to not be happening.
I added a post that mentioned in India they are now making 40 million of these vaccines before they even know it works, Sarah Gilbert had already mentioned that our government will start soon to mass produce and it seems China are going straight to human trials. 
There are of course no garuntees but it seems really strange with 700 possible vaccines that countries are already begin to develop this one. 
Worst case scenario one would hope is if this does not work another country will develop something and surely based on our goodwill of sharing they will share with us.

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The latest news from the Jenner Institute 

Pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca has agreed to manufacture and distribute a Covid-19 vaccine being developed by the University of Oxford if the treatment proves effective.

The company's chief executive, Pascal Soriot, said that "the need for a vaccine to defeat the virus is urgent".

I appreciate they are not producing it prior to evidence it is working but yet another big name gearing up.

Come on Sarah

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2 hours ago, Well b back said:

The latest news from the Jenner Institute 

Pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca has agreed to manufacture and distribute a Covid-19 vaccine being developed by the University of Oxford if the treatment proves effective.

The company's chief executive, Pascal Soriot, said that "the need for a vaccine to defeat the virus is urgent".

I appreciate they are not producing it prior to evidence it is working but yet another big name gearing up.

Come on Sarah

I’m glad it’s looking pretty promising, my brother in law is a toxicologist and worked for a massive company now is a consultant, he’s the one who told me about vaccines which move to human trials will also have a production run alongside it.

Great news on the 40 million if that’s correct.....I’m confident that they know more than being allowed out in the press, as it might mean some people will relax on the current lockdown thinking things will be OK.

👍

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I'm pretty sure it was her I saw interviewed a couple of weeks ago. She was a breath of fresh air with her honesty & crystal clear explanation of the processes & problems of developing a vaccine. No axe to grind. Brilliant.

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1 hour ago, ron obvious said:

I'm pretty sure it was her I saw interviewed a couple of weeks ago. She was a breath of fresh air with her honesty & crystal clear explanation of the processes & problems of developing a vaccine. No axe to grind. Brilliant.

She was all over the media a couple of weeks ago Ron, Andrew Marr and other shows. Very impressive.

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The latest development 

The New York Times are reporting that despite the ethics 8000 people in the USA have come forward to say they are prepared to be given the vaccine, then deliberately infected with Covid 19. 
The fear over here is of course the length of time testing could take due to our falling rates of transmission.

Cutting that record down to 12 or even 18 months would already require moving at “pandemic speed.” But last week, 35 members of Congress proposed an extraordinary practice that some scientists think could compress the timeline even further: deliberately infecting volunteers. Here’s what people are saying about the idea, known as human challenge.

But the pandemic has raised two concerns with the process:

  • Right now, most people are trying not to get sick: The Jenner Institute’s director has said that if the infection rate continues to slow in Britain, researchers may not be able to determine whether the vaccine works.

  • Trials take time: The first phase typically takes months, and the second two take years.

As a result, some experts have called for replacing conventional Phase III testing with human-challenge trials. In The Journal of Infectious Diseases last month, the bioethicist Nir Eyal and the epidemiologists Marc Lipsitch and Peter Smith argued that the idea, while risky, could shave months off the process. “Every week that vaccine rollout is delayed will be accompanied by many thousands of deaths globally,” they wrote. “If the use of human challenge helped to make the vaccine available before the epidemic has completely passed, the savings in human lives could be in the thousands or conceivably millions.”

Who in the world would volunteer to get infected?

Actually, a lot of people, according to Josh Morrison and Sophie Rose, the co-founders of an organization called 1DaySooner, which has gathered signatures from over 8,000 potential volunteers. In The Washington Post, Mr. Morrison and Ms. Rose argue that the idea is not as radical as it sounds: According to one study, the coronavirus’s fatality rate for 20- to 29-year-olds in China was 3 in 10,000 — the same as that of kidney donation surgery and roughly twice that of childbirth in the United States.

 

There really is a sort of confidence in this not seen as a norm amongst scientists. Remember the USA have their own vaccine in progress, yet Congress is discussing this one.

Come on Sarah

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As a quick update there is a meeting in the USA tomorrow ( 11/5 ) to discuss using the human challenge on the 5 most promising vaccines. One assumes this vaccine will be one of them. The WHO have said this can only be done on healthy 18 - 30 year olds under controlled conditions. It appears 1000’s are coming forward to volunteer.

 

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On 28/04/2020 at 16:00, Mark .Y. said:

Along with everybody else, I certainly hope that this works - but a note of caution,although rhesus monkeys have many similarities to humans, I was reading that vaccines have been tested on them before and have appeared to work but did not work when it came to human trials.

I'm not sure that this particular example is anything to do with governments working together, I thought I read that Oxford got off to a flier because they had already done very similar work and had samples etc available. 

Anyway, whatever the reasons, I have confidence that a viable vaccine will be developed soon. 

 

I was watching a Ricky Gervais interview last week, and with him being an animal rights supporter the subject of testing vaccines and medicines came up and Gervais claimed that 80% of the products tested successfully on animals subsequently failed on humans. I can't speak for the veracity of this statistic  but it suggests it's not a straight-line progression from animals to humans.

Another reason to be cautious is the memory of the thalidomide tragedy, in which a drug developed for cancer treatment caused malformed limbs in newborn babies. So there really cannot be any short cuts made in testing because there may be unforeseen consequences.

Still, if people are brave enough to volunteer to be guinea pigs and are aware of the dangers then they should be allowed to put themselves forward.

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Point well taken about the risk of short cuts RTB,  but for clarity Thalidomide was originally promoted as a symptomless sedative and As no prescription was required it was often used to alleviate morning sickness. Years later it was applied to treat malignant cancers and leprosy. It has recently been suggested as a possible therapeutic for CoronaVirus induced pneumonia. Because of its effects the industry was forced to adopt much stricter controls, and given its recent history there was a kind of redemption in the end.

https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04273529

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I was astonished when I read the reference to Thalidomide, but yes it is now used to successfully treat leprosy and some cancers. It’s actually a very clinically effective drug but of course all it is generally known for is the congenital conditions it can induce.

it seems it may have some benefit in calming the severe immune response caused by the virus, which can be fatal. Early days and I doubt any drug is going to be a magic solution but what an odd twist in fate if thalidomide became viewed as a saviour.

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