Authors Anthony Costello
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Modellers believe that spreading out our limited supply of vaccine as single doses for 3 months will save up to 6000 lives. One concern though is whether single doses might lead to 'vaccine resistance' through virus mutation. (1)
If we assume that over the next 12 weeks 12-20 million people get one dose of a vaccine and are told or believe it gives 90% protection what % will actually go for a second jab? We might assume second dose coverage is at best 70%. (2)
That means between 4 and 6.7 million people might have fading protection. Will the risk of creating a vaccine resistant mutant in this group of people, which could spread rapidly to 7 billion people around the world, outweigh the benefits of 6000 deaths prevented. (3)
I was initially reassured by a paper sent to me by an eminent virologist. https://t.co/UyTQZ0CFsW (4)
Essentially vaccine resistance is rare compared with drug resistance, first because multiple mutations are needed unlike for drugs, and second because vaccines tend to keep pathogens from ever achieving large population sizes within hosts. (5)
If we assume that over the next 12 weeks 12-20 million people get one dose of a vaccine and are told or believe it gives 90% protection what % will actually go for a second jab? We might assume second dose coverage is at best 70%. (2)
That means between 4 and 6.7 million people might have fading protection. Will the risk of creating a vaccine resistant mutant in this group of people, which could spread rapidly to 7 billion people around the world, outweigh the benefits of 6000 deaths prevented. (3)
I was initially reassured by a paper sent to me by an eminent virologist. https://t.co/UyTQZ0CFsW (4)
Essentially vaccine resistance is rare compared with drug resistance, first because multiple mutations are needed unlike for drugs, and second because vaccines tend to keep pathogens from ever achieving large population sizes within hosts. (5)
