COVID 19 second vaccine delay

Accordingly, the British government, without public discussion and in an opaque manner, is varying the protocols for vaccine administration. The second dose of both vaccines can now be given up to 12 weeks after the first dose. And it even is permitting that different vaccines can be used for the first and second doses in some situations. Both of these protocol changes have little or no support in clinical trial data.

The goal of these, frankly, large-scale human experiments is to increase the number of people given their first dose and thereby partially protected. Similar proposals about delaying the second dose have been discussed in the US, though on Monday, top officials from the US Food and Drug Administration said in a statement that the FDA does not support changing the vaccine administration protocol initially set forth, based on a lack of evidence that the vaccine would still be sufficiently effective with an altered administration plan. Pfizer, for its part, has said that the trial data do not support that the first dose alone is effective beyond 21 days after injection.

In the US, whatever public confidence has been gained in Covid-19 vaccines is largely rooted in the thorough and transparent evaluation process that allows anyone to attend FDA and US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advisory panel meetings, inspect the data and raise questions.

Hence scientists and physicians can understand what is being evaluated and are able to recommend the vaccines to friends, family and the wider public. The authorization procedures in the UK are far less transparent. So when significant deviations from the recommended use of the approved vaccines are applied, how can the public trust the right decisions were made? How can knowledgeable independent healthcare professionals endorse those decisions when they are not privy to the process?

Making matters all the more concerning, the UK clinical trials of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine were confusing and problematic. It's difficult to understand the basis of various conclusions drawn in the UK about the efficacy of this particular vaccine under various dosing conditions. Perhaps for that reason, the FDA is presumably waiting for an American efficacy trial to be completed before deciding on the approval of this vaccine.