Recent developments with the COVID vaccines are troubling. In our last blog, we explored some of the possible methodological issues in the studies from Modern, Pfizer, and Astrazeneca, and the red flags keep coming. Astrazeneca announced that participants in the trial in Oxford were accidentally given an initial half dose which, curiously, increased the efficacy of the vaccine from 70% to 90%. Meanwhile, Pfizer’s rolling study has generated better outcomes, coincidentally bringing the efficacy of their product to just within 1% of the Moderna offering.
In the media, healthcare experts speak in absolutes preliminary to the public release of any firm data. Vaccine approval and efficacy are assumed, based on faith in the integrity of the pharmaceutical industry and the reliability of government regulatory agencies. So frenzied is the race ahead of solid scientific evidence, UK approval for distribution of the vaccines appeared to occur overnight—rapidly enough, in fact, as to lead vaccine czar Dr. Anthony Fauci to publicly accuse British healthcare authorities of cutting corners.
Undoubtedly these experimental vaccines will provide a benefit, but many questions remain unanswered. What will the true efficacy rate be in a much large population that includes those excluded—obese, hypertensive, diabetic, and immunocompromised individuals—from the Pfizer and Moderna studies? For those vaccine recipients who do respond well, how long will immunity last? Finally, what adverse effects may occur outside of a controlled trial limited to very healthy individuals once billions of people actually receive these vaccines?
Clearly there is little appetite in the healthcare industry to rigorously challenge the science behind the vaccines already beginning to roll out for emergency use by consumers. The combination of demand from an anguished and weary public and peer pressure within the medical field to consider all vaccines “perfectly safe” has resulted in healthcare professionals trading in judicious scientific skepticism for blind faith. We can only hope that in what essentially to amounts to final “phase 4” of clinical trials, where vaccinations are administered to all willing recipients, will demonstrate outcomes as extraordinary as those seen in drug company research.