The Vaccine

Pleased to hear that Applegran! So you didn’t get a headache which seems to be what some people get after they’ve had the vaccine. I’m quite envious of you: I can’t wait for mine!

I had the Pfizer vaccine yesterday and am delighted! no ill effects apart from a sore arm - a bit like the flu jab, and getting better. It has high efficacy and I have to live with the expectation that it will protect me without dire side effects. Life is a series of choices and I am glad to have taken this one - time will tell, but I think it will be OK and a whole lot better than risking gettig Corid 19. We all have to weigh up different risks.

Mr C booked for 19th and he cannot wait!!

Same here M0nica! Hope they won’t be too quick to offer me the Pfizer one, would like to wait for the Oxford one.

As someone with allergies, mainly to medications, like penicillin, etc. i hope, that as we live near Oxford, we will get the Oxford vaccine.

Having said that i had the flu jab this year for the first time without any reaction at all. The problem is, my reactions are so random.

This was discussed on the radio yesterday. The owner of a care home had investigated the legality of insisting that her staff have the vaccine. Apparently, the law does not allow this. Nor can she refuse to employ new staff on the grounds that they were not vaccinated.

According to the news tonight some care home staff are refusing to have the vaccine
I know it is their choice,but i am surprised that in that job they are allowed to refuse and carry on working with the elderly and possibly ill residents

Pfizer didn't need to be sued it admtted liability in many cases. Some of the actions against it were by state legislators. But there have been actions about drug side effects and supplying substandard products, like heart valves

In 1994 the company agreed to pay $10.75 million to settle Justice Department charges that it lied to regulators in seeking approval for the valves; it also agreed to pay $9 million to monitor valve patients at Veterans Administration hospitals or pay for removal of the device.

In 2004 Pfizer announced that it had reached a $60 million settlement of a class-action suit brought by users of Rezulin, a diabetes medication developed by Warner-Lambert, which had withdrawn it from the market shortly before the company was acquired by Pfizer in 2000. The withdrawal came after scores of patients died from acute liver failure said to be caused by the drug.

In 2004, in the wake of revelations about dangerous side effects of Merck’s painkiller Vioxx, Pfizer agreed to suspend television advertising for a related medication called Celebrex. The following year, Pfizer admitted that a 1999 clinical trial found that elderly patients taking Celebrex had a greatly elevated risk of heart problems.

In 2005 Pfizer withdrew another painkiller, Bextra, from the market after the FDA mandated a “black box” warning about the cardiovascular and gastrointestinal risks of the medication. In 2008 Pfizer announced that it was setting aside $894 million to settle the lawsuits that had been filed in connection with Bextra and Celebrex.

SorryJenniferEccles. I wrote that post then went off to do something else before I pressed the post button so hadn’t read what you’d written.

Aren’t they a bit obsessed with suing drug companies/hospitals in America? I’m sure I read years ago that more Caesarians were performed in American hospitals because they were so worried about being sued. Probably due to people having health insurance. But I am going by my terrible memory.

I just did a very crude calculation - the government have purchased enough of the Pfizer vaccine for 20million people. There are 12.5 million over 65s and about 3million health and care staff - so we would all be covered by the Pfizer vaccination purchase if necessary - it depends on the phasing of the supply, and on the approvals and phasing of other vaccines - but I agree with you JenniferEccles, I don’t think as individuals we will be able to pick and choose, particularly now they are considering that maybe the best protection will be gained from having two different types of vaccine anyway.

This subject of lawsuits has been raised before and it has been mentioned that it’s a relatively common occurrence, especially in the States.

I’m sure it would be far too complex to offer people a choice of which vaccine to have. The logistics of the Pfizer one, needing to be stored at-70 are complex enough.

I will have whichever one I am offered, but I suspect by the time it is my turn, maybe not until February or March, it will probably be the Oxford one.

I haven’t heard any suggestion that people will be given a choice as to which vaccine they will be given, only that if there’s a clinical contra-indication to a particular one they may be offered an alternative. Have I missed some information about that?

Posted this yesterday, but I'll just put it here again. Its Astra Zeneca's record of lawsuits since 2000. No company is immune to lawsuits, even ones who develop vaccines. (see what I did there?)

violationtracker.goodjobsfirst.org/parent/astrazeneca

JenniferEccles I think that some people have done research into Pfizer's record and discovered how flawed they are. They have multi-million dollar judgements against them in the US. Their scientists my be great but the management and sales dept aren't.

I wonder if those who say they wouldn’t have the current Pfizer vaccine mean they wouldn’t have any covid jab or just specifically the current Pfizer one?

It’s surprising how many people I have spoken to recently have said they trust the Oxford one more, without giving any reason why.

Maybe if a poll were conducted giving people the choice between the Pfizer or Oxford vaccine, the result might be surprising.

Of course unfortunately there will always be those who will refuse to have any of the vaccinations which will be available in the months to come.

How can they be persuaded, that’s the question.

"Severe allergic reactions to vaccines are "very rare", says Prof David Salisbury, the former director of immunisation at the UK's Department of Health, amid concerns about the adverse responses in two people who had the Pfizer/BioNTech Covid jab.

Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Today programme, he said "they happen in the order of about one in a million doses "and staff who give the vaccine are trained to deal with them.

"We need to be very careful to separate out coincidence from causality," Prof Salisbury said.

They conducted a poll on GMB this morning on whether people would have the vaccine or not the results were disappointing only 53% said they would 47% said no.

Dr.Hilary Jones went on to say that only people with severe anaphylactic reactions and carry an epipen should not at the moment have the vaccine. He didn't mention pregnant or breast feeding Mums but I think he covered that earlier in the week.

M0nica

Pregnant women Are always excluded from drug trials and have been for years. As far as I know there are no plans to vaccinate women in this condition nor those who are breast feeding.

Why do people get so worked up about things that are not going to happen and the fact that these vaccine trials have followed normal protocols.

I fully agree M0nica, I was only commenting that researchers themselves on the programme mentioned that one of the reasons that pregnant women are exclude from trials goes back to Thalidomide.

In fact, it’s a really difficult ethical question as the result of this is that, after a drug is adopted, eventually pregnant woman get it with no real trial taking place, and many researchers are of the opinion that pregnant women should be included in trials.

Pregnant women Are always excluded from drug trials and have been for years. As far as I know there are no plans to vaccinate women in this condition nor those who are breast feeding.

Why do people get so worked up about things that are not going to happen and the fact that these vaccine trials have followed normal protocols.

M0nica

The thalidomide disaster was 50 years ago. The current testing and approval system is immeasurably different and better.

I really do not understand why people keep referring to it. It is totally irrelevant. It wasn't even a vaccine.

I think the issue is that none of the phase 3 trials have involved pregnant women. I believe that the link with thalidomide is that reseachers are still very wary of including pregnant women in trials partly because of thalidomide.

I agree that extra care has to be taken with pregnant or breast-feeding women. I can remember having a respiratory infection in pregnancy and the doctor spending 10 minutes paging through his copy of MIMS trying to find an antibiotic that was safe for me to take in that condition as I am allergic to penicillin.

But automatically harking back to an irrelevant tragedy that happened 50 years ago, passes my understanding.

Thank you ayse I haven't had time to listen to it yet.

Elliane,

It was in answer to a question. They are not sure about lactating women either.

Monica,

I’m just repeating what the scientist said on the above programme.

Incidentally, they also do not know if there will be any long term effects of the vaccines either.

The programme was very interesting and is available on BBC sounds, in four parts if anyone is interested.

I agree that life has moved on, in leaps and bounds in the past 50 years. What I don't agree with is how some people can't see why pregnant women or indeed women currently planning a child might feel worried at the mention of anything foreign going into the body and affecting the unborn child. It is very likely their minds will jump back to this tragedy as I know mine would.