Coronavirus (COVID-19) Discussion Thread

[curl-6]

chakkra said:

curl-6 said:

China has greenlit the military use of a vaccine candidate that showed promising results in Phase I and II trials.

This marks the first approval of a COVID-19 vaccine for use outside clinical trials.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-china-vaccine/cansinos-covid-19-vaccine-candidate-approved-for-military-use-in-china-idUSKBN2400DZ

See? That's what I was talking about. IT HAS to be done this way; there's simply no time to be waiting for Phase III to complete.

I still think taking this approach for the general population would be far too risky. What if it kills people with a specific pre-existing condition? What if it only works in 75% of cases, so people lose faith in vaccination and we never get a high enough immunity coverage to eliminate the disease?

There's already multiple candidates in Phase III, we need to hold on until one of these proves out as both safe and effective before beginning widespread vaccination. Note that even China isn't giving the test vaccine to its general population.