Many types and choices of Covid-19 vaccines

 The world has got many choices of Covid-19 vaccines! So is Australia going to!

 

TGA Australia has approved of Covaxin and Sinovac and very soon people are confident the Australian federal and state governments will approve them to be administered in Australia! What a great human government and department of health Australia!

 

So far, vaccines administered in Australia:

 

Comirnaty (Pfizer, USA)

Covid-19 Janssen (Janssen-Cilag, USA)

Spikevax (Moderna, USA)

Vaxzevria (AstraZeneca, UK)

 

Whereas the major Covid-19 vaccines on earth (besides the 4 above):

 

Cansino (China)

Coronavac (Sinovac, China)

Covishield (India)

Covaxin (Bharat Biotech, India)

Sinopharm (Sinopharm, China)

Sputnik Light (Gamaleya Institute, Russia)

Sputnik V (Gamaleya Institute, Russia)

 

Many more approved vaccines are becoming available in Australia and around the world. Since the technology used to produce different types of vaccines can vary greatly it’s becoming obvious different people benefit from different vaccines in a different way.

 

Naturally inclined people prefer something natural and technologically proven for 20 to 30 years and even longer. These people likely accounts to about 20% (in Australia and around the world) of the populations who’re delaying their vaccination decisions as they may not get access to vaccines with good and proven, old-fashioned, traditional technology, such as the inactivated vaccines.

 

Now, let’s look at types of approved vaccines internationally:

 

Inactivated -

Sinopharm (Approved in 68 countries, 15 trials)

Sinovac (Approved in 41 countries, 22 trials)

 

Messenger RNA (mRNA) -

Pfizer (Approved in 103 countries, 38 trials)

Moderna (Approved in 76 countries, 31 trials)

 

Non Replicating Viral Vector -

Covishield (Approved in 46 countries, 2 trials)

Janssen (Approved in 75 countries, 13 trials)

Sputnik V (Approved in 72 countries, 22 trials)

AstraZeneca (Approved in 124 countries, 46 trials)

 

Percentage and number of humans of population FULLY Covid-19 vaccinated in some countries:

 

Chile 73%, 13.96 million

China 71%, 995.42 million

Canada 70%, 26.61 million

Israel 64%, 5.90 million

UK 65%, 43.69 million

France 64%, 43.13 million

Japan 55%, 69.19 million

USA 54%, 177.93 million

South Korea 43%, 22.27 million

Brazil 38%, 80.79 million

Australia 38%, 9.76 million

Mexico 32%, 41.25 million

Russia 28%, 40.35 million

India 15%, 207.00 million

South Africa 14%, 8.30 million

Kenya 2%, 1.08 million

* Our World In Data, Sept 21, 2021, by Fortune.com

 

Having said that, what countries are using what vaccines? And what types of technology involved? The bigger numbers are:

 

Country; number of humans fully vaccinated; brands of vaccines:

 

China; 995.42 million; Sinopharm, Sinovac, Cansino.

India; 207.00 million; Covishield, Covaxin, Sputnik V.

USA; 177.93 million; Pfizer, Moderna, AstraZeneca.

Brazil; 80.79 million; Pfizer, Janssen, Sputnik V, Astrazeneca, Covishield, Sinovac, Sinopharm.

 

How I admire Brazil! Brazil has all the different technologies used for various types of vaccines! All countries should open and are now opening up all the choices of vaccines so that everyone gets fair and free choices of vaccines.

 

The great governments are leaving political manipulations behind and do the right things right for humans. How amazing!

Who pays for Covid-19? VS: We should get compensation from the United States

China must pay for Covid-19?  “Hey, the United States did a lot of damage to the world with the 2008, 2009 financial crisis. We should get compensation from the United States.”

Check out the 3.5-minute clip from an hour long interview with Kishore Mahbubani (Distinguished Fellow, Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore) and Anton Roux (CEO of ADC Forum, Australian Davos Connection)

“How do you view the emerging sentiment in the media, of China must pay for Covid?”

4 (FOUR) points to be noted (From Kishore Mahbubani):

***** ***** ***** *****

Consider the consequences: If you make it a universal rule that if a country does damage to other countries, whether intentionally or unintentionally, it must always compensate other countries; as you know in 2008, 2009 financial crisis began with the Lehman Brother’s collapse, in New York, right? Now, it did a tremendous amount of damage to many economics around the world. Did any Australians then suggest “Hey, the United States did a lot of damage to the world with the 2008, 2009 financial crisis. We should get compensation from the United States.” Nobody did, right? (1)

What should we learn from this is that instead of being punitive to the country that suffered the first, we should immediately help the country that gets affected first because if we don’t help them, we’ll get affected too.

Now we’re actually very fortunate that at the end of the day the Chinese, after their initial missteps and bungles, came down so hard, so tough that they locked, stopped it completely, almost, in China. And they did some very brave decisions, like locking up a province of 60 million people, 2 days before Chinese new year. Now that’s amazing. I can’t imagine any American politicians locking down America 2 days before Thanksgiving. It’s almost impossible, ‘cause everybody wants to go home for Thanksgiving. And that was what China did. So let’s be very clear and clinical about what China did.

China did many things wrong, but China also did many things right. And the people who say this is not just the World Health Organization. I recommend you read an open letter from the Lancet which is a very prestigious British medical journal, a letter that is signed by thousands of professionals saying “Hey, China did an amazing job, actually, to stop it in its spread.” I think it’s very important to be very fair and objective in our assessment these days.

***** ***** ***** *****
Notes:

1.“Hey, the United States did a lot of damage to the world with the 2008, 2009 financial crisis. We should get compensation from the United States.” Nobody did, right?
- I wonder why not... Why no one suggested or asked the question then?

https://youtu.be/0FGisqJW1cg Kishore Mahbubani: the implications of the current crisis for the US-China relationship | Anton Roux, ADC Forum. Video; 1.01:23, Conducted April 9th, 2020. Uploaded April 10th, 2020.

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)30418-9/fulltext Statement in support of the scientists, public health professionals, and medical professionals of China combatting COVID-19; Published Feb 19th, 2020.

https://www.change.org/p/support-for-the-public-health-professionals-of-china-combatting-covid-19 Support for the Public Health Professionals of China Combatting COVID-19; 19,322 signatures as of April 20th, 2020.

Open source health care system

Open source IT applications in healthcare is a relatively new topic as information technology doesn’t creep into medicine field that fast and widespread, especially in the practice of small clinics.

[Problems faced] Similar to the issue of standardization of linux desktop or other environments for that matter, open source healthcare standardization faces difficulty in interoperability and sharing of data. This is especially true when the open medical IT world is in infancy era.

[Ready? Not quite so.] Members of medical associations are not yet exposed to a few things that are essential elements of the healthcare system like electronic medical record (EMR) or electronic health record (EHR) and clinic efficiency. When even the most infant stage has not been attained, the water isn’t muddy enough to create more creative life form. This is currently what’s happening in many of the developing countries.

[Open source vs. Proprietary] And quite typically enough, infant stages of IT medical applications are usually dominated by proprietary solutions because these closed source solutions offer rigid and seemingly more user-friendly interface even though they’re usually more costly. Not having to tweak with difficult and messy coding of open source feeds well for many people looking for “fire-and-forget” application. Doctors and medical physicians are just human beings who could be as short-sighted. Good things don’t come easy. Those that come easy aren’t usually good. But hey, “I want it and I want it now!” is the attitude of spoilt modern generation. In the end, proprietary are chosen over open source solutions, initially. Almost always the case.

[Idealistic view] The idealistic solution is that the open source solutions will be the de facto standard used by the majority of the doctors. One day. Hopefully sonner.

[History repeats itself] This is a long and challenging task. With members from the developing nations learn from the mistakes made by those in the developed nations. If human beings learn well, we don’t have to repeat the mistakes.

[Evidence-based medicine & Open source] Dr. Molly Cheah, president of Primary Care Doctors’ Organization Malaysia (PCDOM), puts it this way: “Using open source in healthcare is almost similar as evidence-based medical practice processes. How can the processes in medicine be improved? You share.” I find this rather interesting and in line with many of the evidence-based traditional medicine practice. You find a better treatment method or a better explanation of disease mechanism and you pass it on to others so that others can improve upon it and keep passing it on to others too. “There is freedom to use, improve, share and collaborate.”

[My vision of IT usage in medicine] A mature system of medical IT software package should not be just handling of patients’ records and streamlining clinic or hospital efficiency, it should also cater for analysis of symptoms, patients’ profiles, with that of syndromes. For example, the package should help to analyze how two similar patients differ in treatment reactions and how different body constituents or syndromes give rise to different efficacy of the treatments and so on. From the point of view of a physician, this is what counts for the benefit of the patients.

For now, I can’t wait to lay my fingers on Gnu General Public License (GPL) software…

Links:
1) Open Source Health Care Alliance, www.oshca.org
2) International Open Source Network an initiative of the United Nations Development Programme's (UNDP) Asia Pacific Development Information Programme (APDIP), www.iosn.net
3) Primary Care Doctors' Organisation Malaysia, www.pcdom.org.my