AstraZeneca, Moderna, Pfizer. Just some of the big names that have been thrown around over the last few weeks. If you don't know, they are pharmaceutical companies that produce health products and recently, the COVID-19 vaccine. I have already talked about how the vaccines work, but after reading up about the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine, I began to think when will the vaccines be distributed and when will there be enough people inoculated for life to go back to normal?
Distributing vaccines is a very large logistical problem. Who gets it first? Which areas do the Government prioritise? Matt Hancock has already said that the people working in, or staying in, a care home, will be prioritised. After that, health workers, and over-80s. If you are under 50, then unfortunately you are low priority, so we will receive the vaccine last. The way in which the Government will actually deliver the vaccines is not really clear, but it makes sense that they will call people in to large halls, or big venues where social distancing is possible. The vaccine needs to be delivered in 2 doses, each one month apart, so this would be the best idea.
A bigger problem than distributing or delivering the vaccines, though, is actually transporting the vaccine. The vaccines need to be kept in a freezer set at -80ºC at all points, from the lab to the locations at which will vaccination happen. This will cost a lot of money, but also means that there are risks in transport - if the vaccines break or, worse, if the freezer breaks, then all of the doses will be compromised.
So how long will it be before we can go back to normal? Well that depends on many factors, like how fast the vaccine can be developed, and how long the immunity lasts. Like the seasonal flu, SARS-CoV-2 might need yearly vaccination, if immunity does not last that long. But that is a long term issue - what about the lockdown and the restrictions, when can that end? The current predictions are saying that the majority of the population will be vaccinated by Easter, so we should be able to ease the restrictions by then. This relaxation will be due to herd immunity, where if the majority of a population is protected, then if a virus or pathogen is still spreading, it will get trapped and can't spread very far as the majority of people that the infected person interacts with will be inoculated.
Until we reach this point, though, the current restrictions will need to be followed. There will be challenges - the virus might mutate, or some rare side effect might show up as millions of people are given the vaccine. Despite all of these issues, we will eventually get past this. This type of vaccine has never been used before, so we will need to adapt and change our approach as new issues come up. RNA technology has already revolutionised vaccine production, and it is quite easy to change the mechanisms and details of the vaccine, so if the virus does mutate then it should not pose too much of a problem. As more and more vaccines reach the final stage of clinical trials, more and more doses of vaccines will be available. All 3 of the vaccines that are currently being talked about in the news have been proven to be very effective, so hopefully, the worst is behind us.
But above all, stay safe. If you enjoyed this, please leave a like, a comment and share with your friends. As well as that, thank you to everyone who shared last week's post - I really appreciate it.
See you next week!