Vocal Voices

It seems Trump is looking at leaning on the FDA to grant emergency authorisation of the Oxford vaccine about 2 months before the US election, based on the smaller 10,000 person trial. The 30,000 person trial is currently ongoing but will be too close to the election to create much of an impact. For normal FDA authorisation, the 30,000 is a requirement. A week is a lifetime in politics, especially election politics, but 2 months is a century. If they wait for the larger body of results, it will be just 16 days before the election. If they get emergency authorisation, the full 2 course vaccine can be delivered to millions of Americans. Potentially turning the tide of the pandemic in the US.

This is certainly going to cause some controversy but it has some other impacts.

The Oxford Covid-19 vaccine is not a new vaccine. It is an existing covid vaccine (MERS), which was determined safe for human use, on which they changed the protein signature to match Covid-19. This may change the way everyone approaches producing new vaccines in the area.

The Oxford Covid-19 vaccine is a UK product. Not US, not EU, not Chinese, Australian, Russian or of anyone else. It has been created by British skill and knowledge and will be marketed by a British company

It will make completely clear that the decision by the UK government not to participate in the EU vaccine scheme was the right one. The EU doesn't have a vaccine and will not have a vaccine this year (likely). Had we joined the scheme we would have had to provision the EU and EEA states with our vaccine before considering anyone else.

So, once again, the UK is leading, the UK is a large, strong, powerful country. What is new is that nobody else can claim the credit for our work, resources or skills. Perhaps the EU will need to look at their funding to see if they can afford to join the UK scientific discoveries which are currently leading in many areas of the world. Especially as we designed the technology and security elements of their Galileo system.

In short, China may have used the Army as a guinea pig, Russia may have stolen a vaccine, but the UK is leading the world in open and above board medical science in the realm of vaccines.

I, for one, find that comforting.

I think that Trump was / is playing games. From what I hear the Indian phase three trials are not due to end till mid to late October and that implies that there will be no "emergency" issue of the vaccine till November.

Mind you there are a few other interesting snippets. Mosi-Guard, as used by British forces as an insect repellent, contains a compound, citriodiol, that kills coronaviruses in seconds. It is not a medicine, but could be used as an extra layer of skin protection or in wipes for cleaning skin and / or surfaces. The other is the development of a needle-free method of administering the vaccine being tested by the University of Cambridge, and the University of Southampton NHS Foundation Trust. I remember seeing films of a similar system for administering the Smalllpox vaccine. Form a queue, roll up sleeve, a quick wipe, pffft, next! The reservoir could hold thousands of doses and be able to deliver hundreds per hour if necessary. It is apparently not far off and will save millions / billions of bottles, needles and other paraphernalia.