Hypothetically speaking if you were a front-line worker exposed to the public and the vaccine only worked reliably for 90 days wouldn't you get it quarterly? It seems like the prudent approach to get r0 well below until we can drain the reservoir of disease because as others have noted, getting enough vaccines deployed simultaneously globally could be a challenge.
If it's really down to a single company not being able to manufacture enough then it's time to open up the vaccine to licensing and let other companies pile in.
> If it's really down to a single company not being able to manufacture enough then it's time to open up the vaccine to licensing and let other companies pile in.
The world is facing a few problems like this, where the structures of the economy are getting in the way of doing real work. Climate change is another one. If cost wasn't an issue, and everyone was paid by some infinite coffer, we'd have switched to green energy years ago and it wouldn't have been controversial at all. Only now that it's cost effective are we switching en masse to green energy, and we're having to drag economies kicking and screaming away from coal even still.
The community seems to be second to capitalism at every turn, and whilst I know it's not a new thought, it's becoming more and more prevalent that we've made societies devoid of the capacity for community effort.
Edit: Thought I'd clarify, my point is that our governments are meant to supply the community capacity through paying for work with our taxes, but often structures that benefit private businesses win out.
More specifically, you're hopeful that the company manufacturing the vaccine would actually open up to licensing, but they don't have to, and the US has consistently shown it's disdain for compulsory licensing. It would be an exception for them to force the company to license a vaccine, and it's not like pharmaceutical companies have an ethical track record in the US. If it came down to money vs community health, I would absolutely expect money to win out in the US. It already does. Worse yet, the US has bullied other countries into tightening their own compulsory licensing laws, in order to protect US pharmaceutical companies.
A friend in an ED just told me that 90% of her colleagues tested positive for antibodies but many of those worked the entire time and didn’t have symptoms.
There have been a few recent studies of cruise ships and meat packing plants with universal masking. In those cases an extremely high proportion of cases were asymptomatic.
To be clear, higher than in other cruise ships and other meat packing plants.
That’s the possibility, that lower viral load led to milder outcomes.
There was also a swiss military study where one group only got infected after distancing implemented. Positive cases, but no symptoms. Earlier group’s cases had symptoms.
If it's really down to a single company not being able to manufacture enough then it's time to open up the vaccine to licensing and let other companies pile in.