Some promising news on C-19 Vaccine: Pfizer mRNA vaccine may have 90%+ efficacy

Some cruise lines now stating that you will need a vaccine to take a cruise. Royal Caribbean - is going to be the first with a trial sailing out out of Israel. All passengers must be vaccinated and Israel has most of it’s residents vaccinated.

The news today about the 8 million doses is good plus the AstraZenca announcement yesterday. Looks like early summer for everyone that wants one.
But then we have to wait for the provincial politicians to give the go ahead for fans in the stands.

Here's a question in general for all of you physically in Canada, which is most of this forum of course.

Here in Pennsylvania, outside of the City of Philadelphia (which has its own plan because they tell this lame and weak governor what to do not the other way around), the state ex-Philadelphia is still in its first phase due to limited supplies.

I have learned that by work status I am in the second phase, but no timeline is at hand.

Other states are handling the matter differently such as Indiana, which has gone down to "over age 50" down the ages and any folks younger at any time who meet certain higher risk criteria.

So what is taking so long there in Canada?

Is there a supply problem now?
Is there a distribution problem?
Or is there a labour problem (long lines not enough qualified employees to handle the load of patients)?

Please state if you can please how things are going in your province on the ground. It's much more helpful than media reports.

I would put the reason we’re behind as 2 reasons.

  1. Healthcare is a provincial matter so each one is set to do what they feel and make it up along the way. In cases like Ontario, the execution is delegated to the 34 regional health units. So there was no cohesive direction for everyone to follow. Lots of chefs in the kitchen.

  2. Very much a supply issue. Canada has no suitable facility to make the vaccines and not enough funding was provided early enough to Canadian firms researching vaccines. As a result, we need to get to get them all delivered which is subject to production delays and vaccine nationalism. Those are the 2 big reasons why the US is so much further ahead.

Thank you very much for this clarification. Wow. And this sort of thinking is doomed from the start:

In cases like Ontario, the execution is delegated to the 34 regional health units. So there was no cohesive direction for everyone to follow. Lots of chefs in the kitchen.

It’s one thing, as we know down here well from 2020 here in the US, when a federal government abdicates or neglects its duty to set a national policy on a public health matter that transcends state lines or any other human boundaries, and it’s extra special when a province there (or state here) decides to delegate the responsibility to various fiefdoms as if there can and should not be provincial coordination and cohesion!

Refusal to take leadership by the elected few and delegation instead to the elected or unelected many in lower office and this is what you get anywhere no doubt.

Government by consensus does not even work in a wee puny homeowner association. This result simply means the wrong people are getting in office, for leaders make decisions of such importance beyond even their own jurisdiction.

1 Like

Here's a promising sign from Philadelphia this weekend, and what irony too.

A fellow alumnus and old friend was in town to see family and called me on Friday afternoon. As also an American, he moved to Toronto for a new lady in his life and for work last year during the pandemic too, for his employer has a business presence in much of Canada and he can do his job from most anywhere anyway. The reviews on Toronto are quite positive.

On Saturday morning, I met him for breakfast at a local diner and it was the first time I sat down in a local restaurant to have a meal in a local restaurant just over a year! My only exceptions were on a trip to Dallas in November. Downtown Dallas surprised me for the better too, and I highly recommend it.

Everything felt normal at the diner except the masks. I even left my credit card on the table for the waitress after she dropped off the check, and she had to remind me to pay at the front and well, that's how long it has been that I forgot!

If ever there is a tape of my life played before me in an after-life in some divine court room, well I'm going to to ahead and ask them to fast forward between the daytime date I had the last time in Philadelphia on 6 March before things shut down and yesterday's business and catch-up breakfast on 13 March.

It's about time things feel more normal!

The government said today after a slow down in deliveries that 36.5 million would be delivered by the end of June.
Let's hope that the provinces will lift the restrictions by the end of June.

1 Like

For myself I don't mind waiting for a Vaccine. When most vaccines generally take 5+ years, and these were done in less than 2, I will bide my time.
I believe recently there have been some issues with the AstraZeneca vaccine.

I wouldn't believe a word this government says since how badly they bungled it even if my life depended on it.... Oh wait... Still a no.

1 Like

I share your thoughts as well, and I am surprised at how few it seems do. It seems like most either want to rush this and even stand in some stupid line, or they are anti-vaxxers. My view is just let everybody else and all the fuss get out of the way, and then I will set up an appointment and get it done expeditiously without all the noise and drama and especially waiting around.

And I’ve made on executive decision already because I’ve seen enough fuss and propaganda to try to cover up something amiss with JnJ and with Astra Zeneca. No. And
I have had already doubts on two fronts against JnJ with one with their nature as a company with the scandal of their baby powder and another after having worked at a site for 6 weeks and long enough to see that’s a corrupt company more than any given other firm of such size or competitor. I did my work just fine and left for a better job without fuss and before it was going to get worse there.

My target is June whatever they say about getting things done in May here in the US, which generally never happens on time for ANY plans made for May.

I will take the vaccine when it is my turn and until then I will try to follow the rules and guidelines of masking, physical distance as much as possible and only go out when necessary

3 Likes

In Ontario, they are now predicting phase 3 to begin in July, which I believe covers your typical CFL fan base/attending sports fans in general.

So taking into account it’s up to a 4 month wait between doses at this time, this means we are looking at about November at the earliest before we can have something close to 100% attendance at capacity, presuming 2 shots are required for such.

Ridiculous, inexcusable, and too slow …I see like in thankfully only a few remaining spots on here in the US, including the likes of CNN down here, that you have an influential contingent of the “ambiguously perpetual lock-downs and masks” power-brokers and players there in Ontario namely in GTA.

I’m cheering now for Buffalo to move faster so as to show up the hypocrisy across the falls.

The Great UFC Live Public COVID Experiment of 2021 - 24 April 2021

Florida (again) - Who knows when Florida is involved in any given grand plan like this one! The experiment here in the US, no mask mandate, is underway. But will they mandate tests? No doubt they'll do temperature screens.

FULL CAPACITY at the venue no social distancing too!

Canada's Medicago starts phase 3 trials

https://www.google.com/amp/s/globalnews.ca/news/7699019/medicago-glaxosmithkline-trial-vaccine/amp/

By far the most advanced of the Canadian candidates. Most doses will he made in North Carolina to start.

Canada has a pre purchase agreement with them so once they get approved (assuming they will), that will make 6 vaccines. Novavax should be given the green light well beforehand

Florida beaches are packed, bars and restaurants are over flowing, no one is wearing masks on the beaches or in bars/restaurants. There is no social distancing in the restaurants or bars.
I was in Walmart yesterday and a woman walks in no mask and the staff can’t to anything.
Baseball stadiums are open but with 2k in the stands.
You wouldn’t think there was a pandemic in Florida.

1 Like

"Now with the emergence of variants and because they are more transmissible, I think a lot of people are adjusting those numbers up towards more like 85 per cent, or even potentially 90 per cent coverage to achieve herd immunity," Sharma said.

Ah yes, the “experts” moving those goal posts again!

What amazed me last year, and I will fall on my dagger here because I was in alarm after they opened the beach in early April and cases spiked (and still feel that was a bad idea given over 2M cases to date), is how apparently, compared to Pennsylvania, by percentage far fewer elderly and retirees died in Florida despite things being more open there as compared to our more restrictive measures for all of 2020.

I’m not so sure that negligent Tennessee fared better than Florida with its numbers, so let that be the worse case example of what not to do at all as in little or nothing.

In PA in addition, overshadowed by the scandals being exposed in New York and in Michigan with the deliberate undercount of nursing home deaths, the overwhelmingly majority of our deaths in the state took place in nursing homes and some of those were due to sheer government negligence in the face of those certainly most at risk although like in those other states they are trying to find other blame.

The evidence here in PA and in Florida indicates that many if not most of these restrictions were neither helpful or necessary. The debate is which ones of course, and these incompetent folks in ivory towers continue to try to banter via CNN how badly we need more restrictions until we achieve “herd immunity” as they define and redefine it as they are showing already in Canada with the recent movement of those goal posts in Ontario. “Just stay home everybody!” and watch CNN (or CBC there I suppose) and participate on social media is their battle cry because it keeps THEM in some power.

Like over in Texas, maybe there is a healing factor in the sunshine and heat, and not the spread or as grave effects of contagion, as we have been told?

This much I know - far fewer Americans trust doctors now than they did last year and why should they trust them any more on this matter given the disparity in evidence versus recommendations.

Some fairly large anti tyranny rallies today in Europe, parts of Canada, and around the globe

1 Like

Governments overplayed their hand when they started tossing Pastors in jail like they did to James Coates in Edmonton.

1 Like

you break the law, you should go to jail