And if it is successful, we’ll be up against a truly unstoppable force… the infinite human stupidity (to quote Einstein on something he probably never said):
“Fewer than half of people plan to get a coronavirus vaccine in the first year it’s available, and an even smaller group – fewer than a third – say they’ll get it in the first 90 days, a new WebMD reader poll finds.
…
“This serves as a wake-up call,” said John Whyte, MD, chief medical officer of WebMD. “If immunization rates are low, then we’re not going to achieve the level of herd immunity needed to protect us from this virus.”
…
“How are we going to reopen if people aren’t getting the vaccine? We need a ‘Plan B,’” Whyte said.”
Can schools and colleges overcome the inevitable backlash if they mandate vaccinations to return on campus? They already do that for some established vaccines, but you know the crazy is going to be strong on this one. People who wouldn’t wear masks aren’t going to rush to inject themselves with Bill Gates’ tracking microchips.
While I would love for our college students to be among the first vaccinated, there is no chance that healthy young adults are going to be a priority for vaccination in the first 6 months.
I assume that they stocked up ahead of time for this three month span. Maybe they are planning to do a lot of pooled testing. But this is not a long term solution for most colleges because PCR is too expensive, and demands too many resources. Also, if results are delayed, if testing becomes less frequent, or if not enough community members are tested, you could end up with a similar outcome to no testing.
The answer is to continue to develop tests that don’t require labs, lab techs, reagents or swabs. Suck on a strip of paper each morning. If it turns red you are positive, green equals negative. This should have been the goal from the outset, but at least it’s getting resources now (more needed).
It’s reasonable that even pro-vaccine people would hesitate to get a vaccine that launches (if it launches) with no long-term safety data. Especially if the vaccine is a novel technology (which the Moderna product is). I will leave it to the lawyers to discuss whether mandating a vaccine in that circumstance makes sense, or is legally defensible.
College students will be low on the list once any vaccine rolls out because supply will be constrained.
Right - thanks. Even in the last few weeks they are only doing max ~8k a day. They are serving mostly Mass (their local community).
TESTS BY REGION
318,007 from MA (81%)
74,930 from out of state (19%)
They say this:
Our current capacity is 35,000 tests per day, with results typically being returned within 24 hours from receipt. We are working to further increase capacity.
Last I read, they are expecting 500 million vaccines to be ready to go by January; this is roughly double the US population. Plus, the US will probably get priority, given that we are one of the largest countries and the virus here is more widespread than in any other country.
BC is also using Broad. All faculty, staff, and students are being tested before returning to campus. Approx. 15,000 students (undergrad + grad). No idea on faculty and staff.
Most of these vaccines are going to require two doses. US population approx. 328 million.
So, for all the waiting for the vaccine, its effect on spread could very well be minimal even if it is shown safe (at least short term) and effective, while even reasonable people wait for long-term data.
And recruiting 30K people into a clinical trial and demonstrating efficacy and short term safety are high risk endeavors for each of the vaccines in development.
If those hurdles are cleared, we can move on to rolling out the vaccine, I have yet to see a plan for that. Two doses, at least 28 days apart. 18 years old and over. At least for the Moderna vaccine.
I hope people sign up for the clinical trials, and a vaccine launches that many people are willing to take, including the millions of those who are at relatively low risk for covid…which includes many college students.
I think it’s more likely than not this thread turns into a ‘School for all of 2020-21 and coronavirus’ thread, and truly hope things normalize by fall 2021.
The phase 3 challenge is finding older people to participate given that we don’t have proven therapeutics. It’s great that young people are participating but they’re not the group most at risk. Immune systems of the elderly and those with comorbidities often aren’t functioning at optimal levels.
Will also be interesting to see how colleges enforce vaccine requirements because I’ve never heard of a student being asked to leave campus or prevented from starting classes because of non compliance with vaccine requirements.
Not sure how it works at other schools, but DS had to report his immunizations as part of the Student Medical Report Form signed by his physician (or submit official vaccination certificate).
D’s college already put in their CV guidelines that all students are expected to get the vaccine if/when it becomes available. They have not given details at this early stage on if/how that would be enforced.
I don’t know what Yale did exactly, but students who showed up on campus w/o having submitted proof of vaccines were not given their room keys. I think they were sent over to Yale Health for the vaccines. (Saw this unfold as I was helping my child move in.)
One of the ‘return to campus’ requirements this year is the flu vaccine, once it is available, and yes, as suspected, parents are complaining.