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Medicine Politics

Search for Coronavirus Vaccine Becomes a Global Competition (nytimes.com) 137

A global arms race for a coronavirus vaccine is underway. The New York Times reports: In the three months since the virus began its deadly spread, China, Europe and the United States have all set off at a sprint to become the first to produce a vaccine. But while there is cooperation on many levels -- including among companies that are ordinarily fierce competitors -- hanging over the effort is the shadow of a nationalistic approach that could give the winner the chance to favor its own population and potentially gain the upper hand in dealing with the economic and geostrategic fallout from the crisis. What began as a question of who would get the scientific accolades, the patents and ultimately the revenues from a successful vaccine is suddenly a broader issue of urgent national security. And behind the scramble is a harsh reality: Any new vaccine that proves potent against the coronavirus -- clinical trials are underway in the United States, China and Europe already -- is sure to be in short supply as governments try to ensure that their own people are the first in line.

In China, 1,000 scientists are at work on a vaccine, and the issue has already been militarized: Researchers affiliated with the Academy of Military Medical Sciences have developed what is considered the nation's front-runner candidate for success and is recruiting volunteers for clinical trials. China "will not be slower than other countries," Wang Junzhi, a biological products quality control expert with the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said Tuesday at a news conference in Beijing. The effort has taken on propaganda qualities. Already, a widely circulated photograph of Chen Wei, a virologist in the People's Liberation Army, receiving an injection of what was advertised to be the first vaccine, has been exposed as a fake, taken before a trip she made to Wuhan, where the virus began. President Trump has talked in meetings with pharmaceutical executives about making sure a vaccine is produced on American soil, to assure the United States controls its supplies. German government officials said they believed he tried to lure a German company, CureVac, to do its research and production, if it comes to that, in the United States.

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Search for Coronavirus Vaccine Becomes a Global Competition

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  • China (Score:5, Funny)

    by Nidi62 ( 1525137 ) on Friday March 20, 2020 @10:03AM (#59852840)

    Researchers affiliated with the Academy of Military Medical Sciences have developed what is considered the nation's front-runner candidate for success and is recruiting "volunteers" for clinical trials.

    At the very least we will get a good idea of the vaccine's efficacy in Uighurs.

    • Looks like we may not need a vaccine. $20/person for the entire world will wipe out this virus in humans. If we can develop injectibles, we can also wipe out this virus in our food supply.

      Hydrooxychloroquine and azithromycin - two WWII era drugs that have been in use for 75 years.

      • These drugs aren't "cures" per se, they are more about diminishing the duration and the severity.

        You'll still have a bad time. You just have less time of ending up in ICU hell on the brink of death.

      • Depends on whether you believe Professor Dr. Trump or random uninformed members of the public like the Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. I mean what would he know?
    • "At the very least we will get a good idea of the vaccine's efficacy in Uighurs"

      No, a few million Chinese soldiers have already been volunteerized for that purpose.

  • Whoever tries to patent a vaccine should be shot. They will be ransoming millions of lives.
    • Re:Fuck (Score:5, Insightful)

      by pgmrdlm ( 1642279 ) on Friday March 20, 2020 @10:09AM (#59852856) Journal
      You can patent the vaccine and still give away the formula. You REALLY think that any government will not ENFORCE the FREE distribution of the vaccine?
      • The current administration might try. But it would be something like...

        "We're working as fast as we can...very fast...but there's a line. Some people are at the head of the line. Some are at the end of the line. The ones at the end have wait. How long we don't know. Because people need to realize. As time goes on the line gets bigger. It gets longer. The longer things are the longer it takes to get from point A to point B. And there needs to be a vetting process. We don't want people getting this and then w

        • You can justify anything in the name of national security.

          Anything.

          You can justify murder... mass murder, mass slaughter!
          You can justify enslavement, abuse, tyranny, total and complete debauchery. The imagination is the limit!

        • by shanen ( 462549 ) on Friday March 20, 2020 @02:21PM (#59853876) Homepage Journal

          The current administration might try [to profit from the vaccine]. But it would be something like...

          "We're working as fast as we can...very fast...but there's a line. Some people are at the head of the line. Some are at the end of the line. The ones at the end have wait. How long we don't know. Because people need to realize. As time goes on the line gets bigger. It gets longer. The longer things are the longer it takes to get from point A to point B. And there needs to be a vetting process. We don't want people getting this and then weaponizing it against us."

          The original Subject: was not helpful and the associated comment was begging for negative moderation. The quoted comment was also negatively worded, but deserves to be moderated as funny. But I've quoted it mostly to annoy the censors with mod points.

          The insight is that profit and healthcare don't mix well. Good health is not the right kind of good or service. Everyone wants it, but no one actually wants to spend money on it. Everyone would prefer that good health was free as a basis for however they want to enjoy their lives. But bad health is a negative imperative of the highest sort and people will pay anything they can to get away from it.

          Then you add in the insurance companies and their profits and it makes no sense at all. This story is about a vaccine, which makes it an especially good example. How can you profit from insuring against an event that should happen at 100% probability? Obviously you can't, and even though the regulators can force the insurance companies to include vaccines in the insurance policies, the insurance companies are going to insist on adding in some profits. (Politely indirect insistence disguised through lobbyists, of course.) From the perspective of the insurance companies, anything that drives up the amount of insurance coverage we need to buy is a good thing. Bigger policies equals bigger profits!

          Meanwhile, the GOT was on one hand telling people not to worry about Covid-19 while on the other hand selling their own shares before the stock market started crashing. Senator Burr is just the latest poster child for the GOT. Until the next scandal makes the last scandal go away as old news. A scandal a day keeps the accountability away!

      • by clovis ( 4684 )

        You can patent the vaccine and still give away the formula. You REALLY think that any government will not ENFORCE the FREE distribution of the vaccine?

        Nope, I don't think governments will enforce free distribution of the vaccine, I think they'll continue doing things the way they already do.

        My guess is that if the USA does anything at all, it will only be to force the patent holder to grant licensing of the vaccine to other manufacturers at a "reasonable" rate. I think that is likely to happen if the manufacturer is an American company that doesn't voluntarily toe the line.
        It will be expected that the health insurance companies will cover the shots. Medic

        • by clovis ( 4684 )

          I forgot to mention something. Everything gets patented so you have to patent your product in self defense. Your only choice as an inventor is to patent it yourself, or wait for someone else to patent your idea and then pay them for the right to manufacture your own product.

          • That is the desired outcome. Everything, including ideas, wrapped up in some sort of control scheme managed by government.

          • That's not how patents work. If you publish your patent in a public arena then it is prior art and prevents others from patenting that invention.

            I know someone who filed for a patent at the same time they talked about their invention in a magazine interview. The PTO tried to use their own magazine interview as prior art to not issue the patent.
          • or wait for someone else to patent your idea and then pay them for the right to manufacture your own product.
            No, that would fall under "prior art".

        • They'll do it if it's a foreign patent too. U.S. government can eminent domain any patents it sees fit to deal with a pandemic.

        • I would consider this a national emergency. National Security matter. With that said, I don't disagree with you in what you said. My thoughts are, the government might agree to pay for the vaccine. Buy and bulk, and distribute to most infected areas. Honestly, I don't see how the government can not be the entity that does the distribution. They have the most accurate(I hope) data of where most infected area's are. And would be able to prioritize where supplies are sent, and the amount that is sent to
        • My guess is that if the USA does anything at all, it will only be to force the patent holder to grant licensing of the vaccine to other manufacturers at a "reasonable" rate.

          Yeah, that. Whoever (if anyone) holds a patent, they will more than recoup their investment on volume, and developing countries will be covered by a big lump sum.

      • I wouldn't put anything past any government now. The first rule of the government is to look out for itself.

      • Re:Fuck (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Miles_O'Toole ( 5152533 ) on Friday March 20, 2020 @10:44AM (#59852984)

        You actually believe the government of the United States would give the health of Americans a higher priority than the profits of its donor class?

        Aren't you cute!

      • by bws111 ( 1216812 )

        Under what authority could the government 'enforce free distribution' of the vaccine?

        • by ceoyoyo ( 59147 )

          WTO TRIPS agreement, article 31(b) (or more accurately, the local law relating to it), or one of the government use or emergency clauses in most countries' patent acts.

        • The government has guns. More guns and bigger guns than anyone who resists their free vaccination.

          How was this not obvious?

          You know why people pay taxes? Because if they don't the government just takes the money anyway and slaps a penalty on top. How can they do that? See above about guns.

          At the end of the day the gun is mightier than the sword. Forget about pens.
      • Cocksucker Mike Pence spends all his press conference time promoting "public private partnerships", which basically boils down to encouraging profiteering and government resources enabling private profits.

        The distribution will probably be free, but depending on who is in office the question will be whether the government pays only the cost of vaccine production or whether they pay whatever the pharma company decides to charge.

      • Paying them ransom through our taxes is not free!

        They should be paid. Nicely. Really nicely. But ONLY for actual work. And only within reason. (No, no person deserves more than $100 an hour, I don't care what you do!)

        • When I underwent critical surgery to save my life I sure as hell hope my surgeon and everyone else in the room was making more than a piddly $100/hour. Yes, there are jobs worth a fuck ton more than $100/hr even if you'll never have one.
      • Exactly. The only commercial value to this patent will be that the winner can say that they got there first. Like a gold medal in the Olympics: it has little monetary value in itself but the publicity the winner attracts can result in a huge boost to their career. Plus you get the bragging rights.
    • Non essential services are shut down, how will they get a patent through in time?
    • by Anonymous Coward

      So you expect the researchers to work for free? Or do expect the companies to pay them but not get any return? How much of YOUR money have you donated to finding a vaccine?

      • donated or taken from me?

        I would say lots of my money has already gone to helping with this problem considering my tax bill is more than a minimum wage workers gross yearly wage.

        It's just a shame that 100% of it has been mismanaged, wasted, and stolen through all sorts of corruption and greed by the people that are supposed to be looking after it responsibly.

    • by ceoyoyo ( 59147 )

      Every government I'm aware of has legal mechanisms to bypass patents if required. IIRC South Korea did this a few years ago to manufacture some medication.

      A requirement of patenting something is to publish the details of how to make it. The really insidious thing to do would be to keep your vaccine formulation as a trade secret.

  • by Rumagent ( 86695 ) on Friday March 20, 2020 @10:10AM (#59852864)

    They should take a page from Salk and ease the suffering...

    But then again, I am getting old. Doing the right thing neither provides reelection nor shareholder value.

  • Enough people are probably going to get it before any vaccine is produced that we will gain herd immunity the painful way.
    • by Nidi62 ( 1525137 )

      Enough people are probably going to get it before any vaccine is produced that we will gain herd immunity the painful way.

      There are reports that people have been reinfected after recovering from an initial infection. But it's not clear whether these are new infections or an existing infection with false negatives during a low point.

      • I've read several anecdotes from people who have it who describe a couple of days of progressive improvement and then backsliding into a couple of days of feeling worse.

    • The hope there is that acquired immunity lasts long enough for the virus to die out and that no mutagenic strains emerge for which acquired immunity is useless.

      • Most of history & medical research indicates that the more deadly a virus is, the less likely it will achieve mutations to survive in other ways because it keeps killing hosts too fast.

        Considering that this one is not as deadly as some types, there is a good chance this one will mutate. In fact I have been reading that it already has.
        https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/0... [cnbc.com]

        • by CaffeinatedBacon ( 5363221 ) on Friday March 20, 2020 @11:53AM (#59853316)

          Most of history & medical research indicates that the more deadly a virus is, the less likely it will achieve mutations to survive in other ways because it keeps killing hosts too fast.

          Considering that this one is not as deadly as some types, there is a good chance this one will mutate. In fact I have been reading that it already has. https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/0... [cnbc.com]

          It definitely does mutate [bloomberg.com]

          The early work found that infections were doubling roughly every six days, and that for every three to four rounds of transmission—or once every 20 to 30 days—one minor mutation was occurring, Bedford said in a Feb. 13 interview.

          But these are minor mutations. It doesn't mutate in the same kind of way influenza mutates
          It doesn't mutate like influenza [nationalpost.com]
          Seems to be mutating at similar rates to other coronaviruses

          This is less than half the rate at which influenza viruses typically mutate, which itself is slow enough to allow the production of annual flu vaccines.

          suggestions it may be easier to vaccinate against than flu [tufts.edu]

          In terms of creating a vaccine for COVID-19, the immediate goal would be to create a vaccine against what appears to be for the most part a single strain or type of coronavirus. That target might be a little easier than creating a vaccination for the flu, a virus that is endemic and has different strains and different subtypes that can dominate and appear in different years—making it very difficult to predict which will be the emerging flu viruses and costly to develop vaccines, which is why researchers are trying to develop one universal flu vaccine against all of them.

  • ...but I having a hard time finding a vaccine for a bug

    Should we start a clone of ourselves with hardened immune systems in the meantime in case this body gets infected? Hmm, gene therapy this weekend. Thank you crispr and genetic engineering.

    • Crispix cereal. Now with immune engineering flavor packets.

    • It's not a problem of making the vaccine, we know how to do it, and it will happen.

      The challenge is making the vaccine as quickly as possible.
  • by mark-t ( 151149 ) <markt.nerdflat@com> on Friday March 20, 2020 @10:26AM (#59852912) Journal

    A vaccine already exists.

    But it's being tested. This takes time. You don't want to administer a vaccine that kills one out of ten people, for example, when the disease itself would have killed way less than that.

    The testing coupled with the amount of time that it takes to ramp up production of the vaccine for mass distribution, I don't expect there will be any publicly available vaccine for this before sometime in 2021.

    • by Gilgaron ( 575091 ) on Friday March 20, 2020 @10:34AM (#59852946)
      That's another reason that having so many in parellel will be good: some will fail, others may be easier to make than others, and depending on the targets the virus may mutate past some but not others.
    • That is a double edged sword.

      People should be allowed to take the risk if they want.

      Just sign on the dotted line and away you go.

      There are going to be people also dying because they did not get a life saving vaccination because of the hand wringing over safety as well. Not sure we can reasonably say which path is going to save the most lives at this point.

      You can most definitely be so precautious that you are literally being overcautious and negating all benefits of caution and even to the point of it enti

      • I'm nobody who'd take anyone's right to his own body, if he wants to kill himself.
        But you gotta live with that then.
        And frankly, knowing human psychology very well, in most of what we think we want, we're the least in control of it.
        So do you want to let somebody kill himself, if *clearly* that person doesn't have a clear mind? (Frankly most people never actually have a clear mind in their lives, but anyway...)
        You'd be thinking for the rest of your life about that moment when he starts to regret it.

        Unless of

      • by mark-t ( 151149 )

        People should be allowed to take the risk if they want.

        If they can make the vaccine themselves, absolutely.

        What right does someone who might be willing to risk their own life with an untested vaccine have to compel someone else to take an action that may very well kill them, where the person who administered that vaccine would have legitimate grounds to believe that the person who had the untested vaccine probably would have otherwise lived?

        Remember, the fatality rate for this illness is not really that

      • by Uberbah ( 647458 )

        People should be allowed to take the risk if they want.

        And if the vaccine doesn't actually work, and you have an infected person who thinks he's free, running around spreading the virus?

    • by fazig ( 2909523 )
      Have you more information on that?

      As far as I know here in Germany clinical trials have started to test for side effects of the "suspension" they're planning to use for the vaccine.
      I don't know if "suspension" is the right word, here. You know it's the solution that is used to suspend the pathogen in. They are not testing with vaccines that already contain a version of the pathogen that is suited for inoculation.
      Or as an analogy, so far they're only shooting with blanks and test for possible side effect
      • by ceoyoyo ( 59147 )

        https://www.nih.gov/news-event... [nih.gov]
        (for example)

        • by fazig ( 2909523 )
          Thanks.
          There it says that they're testing for immunization effects. That means they're shooting with bullets.
          • by ceoyoyo ( 59147 ) on Friday March 20, 2020 @01:05PM (#59853602)

            This vaccine, the German one, and probably the Chinese one, are mRNA vaccines. These are pretty cool. Basically, you inject some messenger RNA that codes for the protein you want, which is taken up by some of the body's cells, and those cells then manufacture the protein. The immune system sees the protein as foreign and responds to it. These are almost programmable vaccines, and you can quickly make them against all sorts of things. One of the big applications so far has been in cancer.

            They're fairly new though, and still under very active research.

    • Not a Vaccine Yet (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Roger W Moore ( 538166 ) on Friday March 20, 2020 @11:49AM (#59853300) Journal

      A vaccine already exists. But it's being tested.

      It is not a vaccine until those tests are complete. Until then we have no idea whether it will offer any protection at all or whether it may just kill you.

      • by mark-t ( 151149 )

        It is not a vaccine until those tests are complete.

        Are you making some sort of "no true Scotsman" argument here, or is there some non-imaginary source for that assertion?

        • At best, I think you could call it a "vaccine-candidate". We don't know if it works as a vaccine—it might not protect against the disease at all—so it would be definitionally incorrect to call it a vaccine at this time.

          It might protect against the disease, but have horrible side effects, in which case you might be able to call it a vaccine, but probably with a qualifier.

          In any case, until we know if it works, I don't think you can call it anything. It's just an experiment that needs to run its c

        • I'd guess what they mean is that it's not really a "vaccine" if it's not found to be effective at all. Just like ingesting random chemicals can't really be called "medicine" unless it has some specific and known benefit for a medical condition. And the only way to know if its an effective vaccine or not is to do the needed trials and testing.

        • Are you making some sort of "no true Scotsman" argument here

          No. But to borrow from that analogy calling this a vaccine at the moment would be like going up to a random man in the street and saying "this man is a scotsman". It's possible that they might be, the odds are especially good if the street you are on is in Scotland, but until you do a little investigation e.g. by asking them, you have no idea whether you have a scotsman or someone with another nationality.

      • It is not a vaccine until those tests are complete.

        That's like saying "the bullet did not kill Mr. Smith until the coroner concluded his examination of Mr. Smith's body".

        The action already happened. The bullet already did its job, just as it's likely that one of the vaccines-in-testing is actually a vaccine that has already done its job. The only difference is that the bullet's effects are immediately apparent, whereas the vaccine's effects are not. Our inability to immediately recognize a vaccine for what it is does not change what it is.

        Things have existe

        • by sjames ( 1099 )

          Things have existence without our awareness. That you don't yet know it's a vaccine doesn't make it any less of one.

          But you still shouldn't call it a vaccine until you know it actually is one. You might call it a possible vaccine, or a vaccine candidate if you have good reason to suspect it is one. No matter how much the police call the LED Mooninite a bomb, it still won;'t explode and kill people.

        • That's like saying "the bullet did not kill Mr. Smith until the coroner concluded his examination of Mr. Smith's body".

          Yes, it is just like that because, if you have watched any mystery shows on TV you'll know that there is a good chance that Mr Smith actually died from poison before he was shot and he was only shot to make it look like someone else murdered him. In real life, of course, this is somewhat unlikely but there is a very real chance that many, even most of the potential vaccines we have at the moment are not vaccines because they either don't offer protection and/or can cause severe, life-threatening reactions.

    • Nah. A vaccine will be available by this winter at the latest. It may not be approved/used here in the US or some other countries, but at least a few countries will say "good enough, considering the risk/damage this is doing" and start using it earlier than you'd usually see.
  • Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Friday March 20, 2020 @10:29AM (#59852928)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • Tell me how that worked out when China decided to turn cargo ships around with medical supplies. It's a question of national security that your medicine and most medical supplies are abled to be manufactured inside your own borders.

      • hey... I am all for China making these available to the world for free!

        In fact we can get China to pay for the border wall too!

    • This is a pandemic and the only acceptable cost for this vaccine if you want it to work, is going to be free. US Pharmaceutical companies actually fought recent relief legislation to ensure whatever curative is developed has to be priced at their "fair market" prices so its not likely youll see anyone but wealthy boomers lining up for whatever drug we develop.

      While I generally agree, it's the specifics that worry me and hold my attention. While I think it's appropriate in this case for the vaccine to be free for everyone ( and not for altruistic reasons ), I think the folks who develop it should still be paid for it.

      I don't care how rich they are, or how much they can afford to give it away; they are, quite literally, performing a service for humanity, and that deserves compensation.

    • by ceoyoyo ( 59147 )

      That's pretty good. IIRC when they introduced that treatment they were going to set the price at something like a quarter million.

    • by twocows ( 1216842 ) on Friday March 20, 2020 @12:53PM (#59853548)
      I don't think your assessment is entirely fair. If you look at the cost (and financial risk) involved with researching a new kind of drug, getting it through lab tests, and getting it through several stages of clinical trials, then actually ramping up production to produce it at the scale you need, I can easily see the costs getting big enough to justify a pretty nasty price tag. Keep in mind that every stage of the process kills an absolutely huge percent of potential new drugs, so there is a LOT of risk involved with trying to bring something to market; if there's not enough financial incentive to offset that, you won't get the backing of big businesses to begin with and you're stuck developing in the proverbial stone age with access to almost nothing.

      You also have to remember that individuals aren't usually the ones paying the most of that $30k. In many cases, insurance will cover some or even all of the bill for a lot of drugs and procedures. This is a big part of the reason why health insurance is so expensive in the US: because medicine in the US is expensive to begin with.

      A big reason medicine is so much cheaper in other locations is because the research and development is being done in the US and businesses that develop these drugs can use the legal system here to ensure they're able to recoup costs (not just for one drug, but often for the development of many other similar drugs that didn't make it). Not every country respects US patents, trademarks, copyright, etc. That's why the US tends to produce a relatively high number of medical breakthroughs compared to those countries (it's one of the few things the US actually still does pretty well in). And countries that don't respect our legal systems are able to benefit by way of generic equivalents that cost orders of magnitude less. That actually seems a bit unfair to me, but then lives are at stake so of course it's not usually pursued too closely.

      Which of course brings us back to the original question: is the US in the business of eradicating disease? I think we're one of the only ones who really, really are. The problem is that the sky-high costs of doing exactly that are then offloaded to US citizens by way of increased healthcare premiums and still-high out of pocket costs. But I think it's a problem with more nuance than you give it credit for and I don't think there's any one easy solution that won't have its own share of negative consequences.

      And it's also why I think expecting Congress, of all people, to come up with a good solution is utterly insane. We need experts from all the involved fields involved in coming up with a working solution, not a bunch of popularity contest winners.
      • Nice try. Try peddling this theory after accounting for how most pharmaceutical research in the US is conducted by university studies paid for by federal grants, and then reconcile that with the fact that the biggest expense of a major pharmaceutical company is marketing.

        • That simply is not the case.

          The US government spends about $30-$35 billion on drug R&D in a given year.
          Private US companies spend $90 billion (or more, depending on your chosen estimate) in a given year - more than half of the worldwide R&D spending.

          Here's an old paper by the CBO [cbo.gov] describing the issue. The report directly addresses your claim, and disagrees. Let me be clear: the Congressional Budget Office's formal analysis of government drug R&D funding says you are wrong.

          Basically, government

      • Re:And then what? (Score:5, Informative)

        by Uberbah ( 647458 ) on Friday March 20, 2020 @02:58PM (#59854018)

        If you look at the cost (and financial risk) involved with researching a new kind of drug, getting it through lab tests, and getting it through several stages of clinical trials, then actually ramping up production to produce it at the scale you need, I can easily see the costs getting big enough to justify a pretty nasty price tag.

        That's the line from Pharma, but it's just propaganda to excuse price gouging. Most of their costs are in advertising, dividends and executive bonuses, not research. And many drugs are already developed on the taxpayer's dollar, but thanks to a piece of legislation from Bob Dole, university research centers are free to get in bed with Merck or Johnson & Johnson to screw those very taxpayers for the drugs they paid to develop.

      • by kbahey ( 102895 )

        A big reason medicine is so much cheaper in other locations is because the research and development is being done in the US

        I used to be a pharmacist ...

        And I see this argument bandied up around a lot, and goes into the narrative that 'we have been taken advantage of', and the rest of the victim complex by Trump et. al.

        But it is not like that.

        First, there is a significant portion of pharmaceutical companies that are European.

        For example Hoffmann-LaRoche, Novartis, Janssen-Cilag, Alliance, AstraZeneca, GlaxoS

        • A) More than 50% of all worldwide drug R&D is performed by private companies in the United States.
          B) Many of those European companies make the majority of their profits by selling drugs at high prices in the US - Despite the EU having a larger population, European companies make less than half of their revenue from there.

          therefore C) If the US paid the same prices as other countries, then those European companies would be unable to contribute even the 17% to worldwide R&D that they currently do.

    • by kbahey ( 102895 )

      We invented a cure for Hepatitis C and it currently costs thirty thousand dollars ...

      It is more than that, the Gilead Hepatitis C cure actually costs $84,000 dollars.

      • by Guppy ( 12314 )

        It is more than that, the Gilead Hepatitis C cure actually costs $84,000 dollars.

        It hasn't cost that much in some time. Gilead had a remarkable amount of lead-time over their competitors with sofosbuvir and its combinations, but at this point it has around 3 or so competitors in the market (applicability varies with HCV genotype).

  • Vaccines have long-term effects, but might also have side effects, especially when don't have a lot of perspective. Injecting that into millions of people is taking a big risk. The difference being that a vaccine makes the body react and creates antibodies, while an antiviral works directly on viruses. An antiviral drug might be a better choice (if we have a choice).
    • >>Vaccines have long-term effects,

      I hear they cause Autism. Jenny McCarthy told me so.
      • Explanation: Usual vaccines (tetanus...) are *of course* recommended. Coronavirus, we're talking about using a vaccine that has been barely tested ; testing takes usually a year, at least. Some people want to go fast, it's too fast.
    • by Anonymous Coward
      An antiviral solution is something we should look for if vaccination doesn't work.

      Antivirals certainly have their place in medical treatments.
      However antivirals often have an extremely narrow bandwidth in which they work. If the virus mutates a little it may no longer work without being adapted.
      Hardening the immune system, which is by nature adaptive, can work better in those cases. Although of course it's not always perfect which can be seen from influenza vaccines.

      In any way vaccines work as a preve
      • Of course vaccination is the right choice otherwise! My point is that a coronavirus vaccine would not be tested enough, if it is made available now.
    • No, it really is not a better choice. You will most likely only know that you have to take an antiviral drug when you are sick and the virus very well might already leave lasting damage in your lungs by then - and the probability for that is way higher than a side effect from the vaccine, which, on the other hand, prevents an illness in the first place.

      • by OzPeter ( 195038 )

        No, it really is not a better choice. You will most likely only know that you have to take an antiviral drug when you are sick

        And that's not even considering how many people you infected while you were asymptomatic

      • My point is that a coronavirus vaccine would not be tested enough, if it is made available now. Of course vaccination is the right choice otherwise!
    • by ceoyoyo ( 59147 )

      A vaccine is pretty much always a better choice. An antiviral drug is likely a better choice than an *untested* vaccine.

      • An antiviral drug is likely a better choice than an *untested* vaccine.

        This is my point! A vaccine already available, now, while testing takes usually a year at least, would be too early!

        • by ceoyoyo ( 59147 )

          I expected so, but your wording was a bit ambiguous. Vaccines are usually much safer than treatments, and more effective since they prevent you, and if used correctly, everyone else, from getting the disease. But, because you give them to everyone, you want to be very sure about that safety part.

          Treatments are usually only partially effective and tend to come with more risks.

  • The long-term negative effects on those > 60 is irrelevant, really. The long-term effects of SARS-COV-2 are relatively bad for the elderly, so the vaccine just needs to be less worse than that.

    In any case, the normal virus approval protocols won't work because this is an existential threat to today's society. Assuming that the normal approval process is the only possible process would be naive.

    When the vaccine works and can be rolled out life will be back to normal (yay!). The faster the better.

  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • by BAReFO0t ( 6240524 ) on Friday March 20, 2020 @11:34AM (#59853222)

    This should be where we show what we can do with *teamwork*! Across borders, because it is literally in everyone's interest!

    Oh, well. Maybe not in everyone's.
    Can't stand this humanity anymore either...

  • Well, from a straight genetically racial standpoint, what works for China (the populace of the country China) may not be the best for everyone who is Chinese (a citizen of the country). There's "Han", the major ethnic group, and then there is the rest, which comprise less than 10%:
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

    Now, where the people in China differ, is (this is first-hand, and therefore anecdotal evidence, someone may have a link) is that the people that I know who are Han, or biracial, the Han side
  • Just work together shit heels..... It's truly more valuable, but trash will be trash
  • A successful vaccine no matter who gets it first will help the rest of the world advance herd immunity. Sales aside there will like be some bickering on how to compensate those who developed. Public pressure would mount to share the formula. While there is no guarantee, it is a better position than no vaccine. Relax and let the experts focus on the priority finding a solution vs todayâ(TM)s roulette, whether get it , overcome or die.
  • Nationalism is an ill considered response to a global threat.

Understanding is always the understanding of a smaller problem in relation to a bigger problem. -- P.D. Ouspensky

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