One year on from…
The Good…
The Bad…
And the Ugly…
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Google translate:
Here have Ben Maier and
the AstraZeneca thrombosis risk based on the data in the UK is recorded in a true-to-scale area chart. It becomes apparent how negligibly small it is, and not higher than without vaccination.
Google translate:
In the United Kingdom, the AstraZeneca and BioNTech vaccines each inoculated around 10 million doses. Temporal relationship with a pulmonary embolism (mostly triggered by blood clots = thrombus): 13 cases in AZ, 15 in BioNTech.
His following tweets read,
In both cases there was no noticeable increase in comparison to non-vaccinated persons. Nevertheless, one pulmonary embolism / blood clot anecdote after another has been chased through the media for days exclusively in relation to AstraZeneca. 2/4
At the moment, of course, I don’t know whether there might be a connection. Certainly very rare side effects will only show up over time. This is the case with all medicines. It was no different at BioNTech (anaphylaxis etc.) 3/4
For the purpose of classification: If you have to go to hospital because of Covid19, the chance of thrombosis is about 1: 6. I have the impression that a lot of the media are overwhelmed by the situation and are causing enormous damage in their awkwardness. 4/4
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As I said at the time, imagine those poor people crammed in there being exposed to that horror.
And some of them probably got covid too.
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This is pretty good
There are four types of COVID-19 vaccines: here’s how they work).
They all work by training the immune system to recognize the corona spike protein, but differ in how they teach it to do that.
This is the first time we’ve actually had a successful mRNA vaccine be developed, which is what both the Moderna and Pfizer ones are. Both the J&J and AZ vaccines are Adenovirus viral vector vaccines, and the Novovax one is a protein subunit vaccine.
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At this point I think Austria, Denmark, France, Italy, and Germany have now all suspended use of the AstraZeneca vaccine. There may be other EU countries I’ve missed. The EMA is due to meet tomorrow so it will be interesting if they suspend its approval as well, EU-wide. If they don’t want it, presumably they can send those doses elsewhere? Like Australia? Or the UK? 
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Ireland, Netherlands and Norway as well after reports/results coming out of Norway
Yesterday.
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I knew I had probably missed some. Sorry! It’s all…a bit…weird.
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The potential issues with the vaccine or that you missed something
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Haha. No, I miss stuff all the time… 
I mean the reaction to identifying this potential side effect. A side effect that actually shows no greater prevalence than in the general population and is pretty much equivalent to the numbers from Pfizer.
There might be a different side effect that is tangibly elevated (as I mentioned last week) but it doesn’t appear to be pulmonary thrombosis.
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Strange that it’s being halted when the public data don’t seem to justify it. You have to think there is some sort of second or third degree consideration here of feeling like they have to be seen to be hyper strict given the amount of skepticism that exists for this vaccine. I don’t agree with that and think the best messaging in cases like this is one that is completely honest and transparent, but it’s hard to read it as anything else.
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In Ireland I think we are just being cautious as there hasn’t been a lot of skeptism towards AZ other than how unreliable they’ve been at delivering product.
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I think it’s a bit odd focusing on the pulmonary thrombosis angle, which appear to be equivalent to Pfizer and no more so than the general population.
More notable, potentially, is that there have been twice the number of deaths from myochardial infarctions following AZ than Pfizer (12 to 6). Of perhaps more concern is that there have been 4 deaths from diarrhoea among those who have taken Pfizer, but none among those who have taken AZ.
There have been 6 deaths from “asthenic conditions” with AZ compared with 1 from Pfizer.
Much higher prevalence of fatigue, chills, and pyrexia (whatever that is [edit: it’s a fever]) with AZ than Pfizer.
AZ: Fatigue 13,2020, Chills 14,442, Pyexia 18,640
Pfizer: Fatigue 6,438, Chills 3,364, Pyrexia 5,153.
(those aren’t deaths, just side effects)
Twice as many people died from covid-19 following Pfizer vaccinations than AZ (22 compared with 11). It would be interesting to know if this was due to the extended intervals, which are said to make AZ more effective but may weaken the efficacy of Pfizer if extended beyond 4/5 weeks.
Twice as many people died from a cerebrovascular accident (6) following vaccination with AZ as did following Pfizer (3).
There was one (non-fatal) instance of verbal abuse following the Pfizer vaccine but none from the AZ vaccine. Allowing us to conclude that @Scott.Jones has had the Pfizer vaccine.
I’m not sure what the category titled “immunisations” is about. AZ there were 50 reactions related to the COVID-19 immunisation, with one fatality. 31 reactions to “immunisation” unspecified, no deaths. With Pfizer those numbers are 17 reactions to “COVID-19 immunisation”, with no fatalities and 5 reactions to “immunisation” unspecified, no deaths.
Overall there appear to be a lot more “reactions” following the AZ vaccine (201,622 are recorded, 275 fatal) compared with Pfizer (94,809, 227 fatal). Pfizer has also been given in slightly greater numbers, although there’s not much in it (both have had over 10 million doses administered).
The key take aways from me though, where the numbers do seem to diverge notably, were that you were twice as likely to suffer a fatal myochardial infarction from AZ but that nobody has yet died from shitting themselves, unlike with Pfizer (4).
All these chances are infantessimally small but if I was going to go out, I think I’d choose it clutching my chest than swimming in my own shit.
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Shit… and the big EU nations follow suit. PEI in Germany are putting their name to this action, so their reputation is on the line if this is some petty political game. Need more information on what this decision is being driven by.
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Statement from PEI: Paul-Ehrlich-Institut - News - The Paul-Ehrlich-Institut informs - Temporary Suspension of Vaccination with COVID-19 Vaccine AstraZeneca (pei.de)
The particular issue identified is stated as,
“Compared to the status on 11 March 2021, additional cases (as of Monday, 15 March 2021) have now been reported in Germany. Analysing the new data status, the experts of the Paul-Ehrlich-Institut now see a striking accumulation of a special form of very rare cerebral vein thrombosis (sinus vein thrombosis) in connection with a deficiency of blood platelets (thrombocytopenia) and bleeding in temporal proximity to vaccinations with the COVID-19 vaccine AstraZeneca.”
In the UK we’ve only had 3 instances of that type of reaction (no deaths) in over 10 million AZ doses (1 instance for Pfizer, also no deaths).
Strangely, nobody’s talking about the 4 deaths from diarrhoea following the Pfizer jab!
To add to the above, there was 1 fatality described as “Immune thrombocytopenia” following the AZ jab (35 thrombocytopenia reactions). This compares to 22 thrombocytopenia reactions from Pfizer and also 1 death (described as “thrombocytopenia”).
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…had to re read this… well played.
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So if Italy have stopped using AstraZenic, does that mean Australia can get the doses Italy were blocking and refusing to export?
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