
The Russian vaccine for Covid-19 - DyslexicAtheist
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanres/article/PIIS2213-2600(20)30402-1/fulltext
======
AJRF
One interesting coronavirus metric I’ve been tracking is mobility indexes. I
know it sounds tin-foil-hat-y but I don’t trust western media coverage on
Russia or China and so to gauge the situation in those countries I’ve tried
looking at data rather than opinion.

The Citymapper app has a “CityMapper Mobility Index” which shows what
percentage of a given city is moving compared to a pre-March peg. It’s been
interesting to see Moscow and St.Petersburg back to almost 100% capacity.

~~~
apexalpha
Do you mean this one? [https://citymapper.com/cmi](https://citymapper.com/cmi)

Because it shows Moscow and St P at 79 and 88%. Around the same as Brussels
but lower than Paris and Lyon.

~~~
tim333
I think it must be. It's kind of interesting the data. You can see London
shutting down around when I left and now can see Paris and Lyon as the most
back to normal which maybe explains why there are a lot of new cases there
now.

------
rossdavidh
So, I could totally believe that this is mostly a political gesture, and
Russia is doing this mostly for propaganda purposes. But, honestly, even given
that, I found the tone of the article to be biased and speculative, in an
anti-Russia way. FUD should not be the main component of an article in a
medical journal. Give us some facts about the situation, or if you don't have
any facts to give, write a shorter article.

~~~
ak217
The second paragraph contains a link to the phase 1/2 results that the vaccine
creators published in the same journal. Because of unexpected patterns in the
data in those results, there are doubts about their veracity, which is
consistent with the idea that the institute is cutting corners in the trial.
If it turns out that they did make up the results and the vaccine is more
dangerous and/or less effective than expected, the journal will be known as
complicit in the backlash that ensues not just against this vaccine, but
against all others as well. So the journal wanted to temper their implicit
endorsement made by publishing the original article, and this is the result.

------
danjc
The choice of name is interesting. Is this a throwback to the space race as
in, “we got there first”?

~~~
somesortofsystm
Sputnik means travel companion. In the context of COVID-19, its probably a bit
more surreal than it ought to be, name-wise ..

~~~
tetromino_
It's a two-component vaccine using two different adenovirus vectors. Hence
"traveling companion" and "v(irus/ector)". Plus, of course, the name is a
reminder of Soviet space achievements.

------
JoeAltmaier
From the article:

    
    
       "...the middle of a Pandemic is not the time to be cutting corners"
    

I wonder when is the time

~~~
BurningFrog
In reality an emergency is of course exactly the time to take more risks.

~~~
bluGill
There are some risks wroth taking and some that are not. The problem with
risks in an emergency is they can make things worse. Emergency officers are
often killed when they choose to risk going faster than the speed limit - even
though they have sirens on to warn everyone they are taking extra risk for an
emergency.

~~~
BurningFrog
Part of the _definition_ of risk is that it can make things worse!

My point is that in emergencies, stakes are higher, so the potential benefit
from taking a risk is higher.

------
ComodoHacker
There were questions [0] to phase 1/2 results published data, which AFAIK has
not been answered yet.

0\. [https://cattiviscienziati.com/2020/09/07/note-of-
concern/](https://cattiviscienziati.com/2020/09/07/note-of-concern/)

------
SpaceRaccoon
> On the other hand, it is entirely possible that Russia will hold off
> vaccinating its general population until it has received favourable results
> from the phase 3 trial. In which case, the announcement of the approval of
> Sputnik V might amount to a political gesture, rather than a serious attempt
> to circumvent the standard process of vaccine development.

Yes, it really was mostly a political gesture. General inoculation isn't
planned for until Jan 1st, 2021.

~~~
ladberg
Jan 1st is still way earlier than any other country could feasibly do it.

~~~
rsynnott
Expect that to be pushed back if there are any hitches in what is, in reality
a phase 3 trial. Which there probably will be; there generally are.

------
eugene3306
There are two vaccines on the final stages of development in Russia. One from
Gamaleya center (Moscow), another from «VECTOR» facility (Novosibirsk). From
my (layman's) point of view, Gamalaeya's vaccine is somewhat hurried in
development. Also, Gamaleya is known for its lobbying power. In the past, it
approved and popularized a number of controversial drugs like Kagocel and a
few of «-feron» drugs. VECTOR's vaccine, on other hand, looks more
trustworthy.

~~~
romwell
Vector is an established facility with a long history.

I'd wait until Vector's stuff is ready if I were living in Russia.

~~~
SomeoneFromCA
Yes, as someone who lives in ex-USSR, I agree.

------
ishcheklein
> Post-registration clinical trials involving more than 40,000 people in
> Russia will be launched in a week starting from August, 24. ... The vaccine
> has received a registration certificate from the Russian Ministry of Health
> on August 11 and under emergency rules adopted during the COVID-19 pandemic
> can be used to vaccinate the population in Russia. Mass production of the
> vaccine is expected to start in September 2020.

It feels like it's "under emergency" marketing and it is still ongoing phase 3
trials. I hope they have enough sense to not mass vaccinate everyone in a
month or two.

~~~
owl57
No one has production capacity to vaccinate everyone in a month or two. So yes
of course, they said only healthcare workers and teachers are going to get it
this month, and not all of them. Will it be actually voluntary, as promised,
or some new absurd process? You never can tell with Russian government.

~~~
johnisgood
Yeah, it could easily be mandatory. You must get the vaccination to work in
health care. You must get the vaccination to be a teacher. You get the gist.
We have this here with hepatitis B vaccine. Why not with this vaccine? They
definitely could do this.

------
_aleph2c_
I would take it if it was available to me. The risk of a side effect seems
much lower than the risk of catching or spreading the disease to others.

~~~
andrepd
You have absolutely no basis on which to make that statement. There is no data
about the vaccine (and about the virus) to reasonably assert that the risk of
the vaccine is lower than the (low) risk of infection if you take mitigation
measures such as wearing masks and limiting interaction.

------
pplonski86
There is a Polish joke video about Russian vaccine
[https://youtu.be/vN2eQ_CKZT8](https://youtu.be/vN2eQ_CKZT8)

------
dedosk
Seems like you can gain some hunting skills after using this vaccine:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vN2eQ_CKZT8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vN2eQ_CKZT8)

------
aaron695
You can get 'vaccines' on the dark markets (ie Agartha). Hard to say if they
are real. They say they are from animal and human trails. $500

No Russian vaccine yet I can see.

But if it is being produced in India, which this is, along with permission for
the Indians to produce it for internal use, then I'd guess it'll be available
on the clearnet.

Do you let your 80 year+ male family and friends risk death from Covid or buy
it online... Plus of course to do it for fun.

~~~
bart__
Do you mean this agartha, reviews seem to indicate it is a scam?
[https://www.darknetstats.com/agartha-
market/](https://www.darknetstats.com/agartha-market/)

~~~
aaron695
Good point. You definitely seem correct.

Most of the big ones were being DOSed when I was checking.

I found this which suggested Agartha, but they do actually mention it's not
‘approved’ by Darknetlive.

[https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3581387](https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3581387)

I wouldn't expect the Russian vaccine yet, and I'd google around before buying
it. I'm already on a trial vaccine so I'm not supposed to get any other
vaccines. But I might buy a non-animal vaccine for family when it comes out.

------
StreamBright
I was just in a call with somebody who is working in the medical industry on
COVID vaccine and he explained to me that GDPR puts many of their efforts in
jeopardy because if any patient issues a deletion request they have to delete
the data which is very ward for them. It is interesting to see how legislation
can slow down progress.

~~~
viraptor
What do you mean by puts in jeopardy? So they realistically expect that a
large portion of the tested people will request to delete their data? Is there
any basis for that? As I understand it's a very uncommon occurrence even in
companies people really should be requesting it from.

~~~
StreamBright
It is enough that one requests it if the data system is not prepared for that.

~~~
elliekelly
Did this anecdotal conversation actually happen? I'm highly skeptical for
several reasons. The first being that GDPR's "right to be forgotten"[1]
absolutely, unequivocally, without a shadow of doubt would not apply to a
patient in a medical trial. Even if the patient withdrew consent for data
processing _and_ objected to the continued processing of their data under GDPR
they _still_ would not have the right to have the data deleted for several
reasons:

1\. The data isn't being processed on the data subject's consent alone. It's
also being processed because it's necessary to perform a public task which is
a legal basis for processing data under GDPR. It's also probably being
processed under the "legitimate interests" of a third party (the
pharmaceutical company) whose interests in the data, in this case, override
the individual's interests in having the data deleted which is another legal
basis for processing. So the medical trial has _two_ (of only six) lawful
bases for data processing should the patient withdraw consent. Only one lawful
basis is necessary.

2\. Article 17(3) _specifically exempts_ compliance with the right to be
forgotten when data processing is necessary "for reasons of public interest in
the area of public health" (paragraph c) _OR_ for record-keeping purposes "in
the public interest, scientific or historical research purposes or statistical
purposes" (paragraph d).

3\. Article 17(1)c and Article 21(1) would allow continued processing of the
data due to "compelling legitimate grounds for the processing which override
the interests".

4\. Article 21(6) would allow continued processing of the data for reasons of
public interest.

Surely someone in the EU conducting medical research would be well aware that
GDPR is not at all a barrier to medical trial data processing.

[1][https://gdpr.eu/article-17-right-to-be-
forgotten/](https://gdpr.eu/article-17-right-to-be-forgotten/)

------
georgewsinger
Good for Russia: taking steps towards allowing free & consenting adults the
ability to use an experimental vaccine at their own risk, should they consent
to do so, and with the potential to generate _massive_ positive externalities
for the rest of the world in the process.

How cringe is it that Russia (of all places) has beat the U.S. in allowing
their population the right to access new technology?

Literally hundreds of thousands of people have died during this pandemic, and
our regulatory agencies have -- in the name of "protecting us" \-- literally
blocked off people from being able to experiment (on their own property) with
ways to prevent the spread of more mass death. Unbelievable.

Not to mention the tail risk of bottlenecking a life-saving vaccine until a
government agency deems it "safe", and then suddenly releasing it all at once
to massive portions of the population. If instead you let early risk-takers
experiment on their own watch, you get orders of magnitude more data to work
with gradually as opposed to suddenly unleashing a single vaccine (deemed
"safe" by the FDA) to tends of millions of people at once.

~~~
CGamesPlay
Eh, if this turns out to be the next Theranos, then we'll be glad that the
government stopped our innocent civilians from being duped by this trickery.
It's kind of a double-edged sword.

~~~
anon9001
What happens if I no longer trust our government to protect me from predatory
business practices? I ask that, because I no longer trust the CDC after their
series of recent scandals.

Ironically, it's largely due to successful Russian efforts that I no longer
know who to trust for advice on vaccines.

From what we're hearing so far [1], it seems that POTUS will promise a vaccine
is on its way just before the election, but then never deliver it. What I'm
worried about, though, is that a vaccine will simply show up and start being
rolled out by a compromised CDC, or FEMA, or Army, or whoever the
administration can force to do it.

[1] [https://www.axios.com/trump-cdc-redfield-
vaccine-d266121c-88...](https://www.axios.com/trump-cdc-redfield-
vaccine-d266121c-88f0-4b82-bd97-4a4125089f93.html)

~~~
didibus
> I no longer trust the CDC after their series of recent scandals

Care to link? Feel I must have missed some news, as I'm not aware of any
scandals around the CDC?

~~~
anon9001
Sure, most of it comes down to the administration putting unqualified people
with poor financial incentives in positions of high power.

There was this particularly transparent example by the _Director_ of the CDC a
couple of years ago, about buying tobacco stocks when put in charge of
programs for reducing tobacco usage:
[https://www.politico.com/story/2018/01/30/cdc-director-
tobac...](https://www.politico.com/story/2018/01/30/cdc-director-tobacco-
stocks-after-appointment-316245)

Also this story about how FDA appeared to bend to political pressure to
greenlight an experimental treatment due to political pressure, bypassing the
normal guidelines for demonstrating efficacy:
[https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/why-did-fda-
autho...](https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/why-did-fda-authorize-
convalescent-plasma-potential-treatment-covid-19-n1237848)

There's also been a general failure to respond appropriately to the pandemic.
We're so many months in and PPE is still an issue: [https://www.msn.com/en-
us/news/world/8-months-into-pandemic-...](https://www.msn.com/en-
us/news/world/8-months-into-pandemic-largest-n95-producer-ceo-says-ppe-demand-
still-greater-than-entire-industry-capacity/ar-BB1975yY)

And that's not even counting what the White House is doing, which is not good.
Especially with the recently leaked audio tapes from Woodward from the same
time POTUS was publicly downplaying it:
[https://youtu.be/-cfd_pJVYiM?t=179](https://youtu.be/-cfd_pJVYiM?t=179)

Plus the hydroxychloroquine thing...

There's a lot of buzz lately about how the administration is trying to
influence the CDC, but most of it is journalism/politics blue twitter insider
type chatter:

* [https://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2020/09/politico-trum...](https://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2020/09/politico-trump-aides-demand-that-cdc-publication-be-more-optimistic/)

* [https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/medical/trump-e2-80-99s-att...](https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/medical/trump-e2-80-99s-attempts-to-corrupt-the-cdc-explained/ar-BB192e7i)

* [https://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2020/09/politico-trum...](https://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2020/09/politico-trump-aides-demand-that-cdc-publication-be-more-optimistic/)

* [https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-appointees-sou...](https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-appointees-sought-to-alter-cdc-scientific-reports-so-they-dont-contradict-or-undermine-the-president/ar-BB18X6nO)

But there is a lot of it, and that's pretty unusual for an organization like
the CDC. Maybe it's all disinformation, but keep in mind it's the President's
job to appoint the Director of the CDC:
[https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2020/03/trumps-cdc-
dire...](https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2020/03/trumps-cdc-director-has-
a-history-of-controversial-opinions-on-controlling-viruses/)

I'm not saying every smear against the man is true. But after the last
director had to resign over the tobacco thing, and the current director is now
clearly affiliated with the President, so I'm skeptical if he has the public
interest at heart.

I've never had less faith in American institutions, and I think it's for good
reason. There's a lot of corruption at the top, and it's clearly infiltrating
the institutions.

If they say a vaccine is safe to get, I don't think I can trust it. I'm going
to need to dive deeper into opinions of professionals when it becomes
available before I get it.

~~~
didibus
Hum, okay I see what you mean. I think maybe it's premiditated to conclude
that it's untrusworthy yet, but I wouldn't blame anyone from being a bit
skeptical and double checking with say the Canadian and European health
institutions to see if the advice is similar, and if not that might need to
trigger some investigation into why they'd differ so much? And I don't know,
throw in China and South Korea and Russia in there as well, in theory, all
country should advise pretty similar things, medical science is mostly
universal so any major discrepancy would be disconcerting a bit I admit.

That said, I also don't want to fall into some fallacy of nirvana, I don't
believe any governement ever existed in a perfect state with zero bias and
total absence of corruption, sometime all we have is good enough to go by.

And I also wouldn't want to fall in the fallacy of inflation of conflict,
where because there are scientific disagreement in the medical community,
especially given a very new very unknown problem such as Covid, that no
conclusion can be reached or that the legitimacy of that field of knowledge is
questionable.

~~~
anon9001
I agree with you entirely, and I think that will be my plan. It could be a
problem though if US society is back to "normal" with a "vaccine" that ends up
rushed through some how, and I'm one of a few crazy holdouts that don't trust
it.

Would any of our Russian comrades reading along care to weigh in on how
they're feeling about getting the vaccine on release day?

~~~
orbital-decay
eugene3306 summarized it best:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24512974](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24512974).
As someone fairly familiar with Gamaleya I agree completely, they are known to
be responsible for some "bullshit-micyn" drugs as we call it here, so I'd
hesitate to be an early adopter for their vaccine. (also you'd get funny looks
if you called someone comrade in Russia, just saying)

