Australia to Make mRNA Vaccines

[bhobba]

Here in Aus, IMHO, we have not been proactive enough. Finally, someone is taking a more long term view:
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-04-21/victoria-to-develop-mrna-covid19-vaccine-facilities/100083372

Thanks
Bill

 

[Ygggdrasil]

Even if they do not help with the current pandemic, the effort is a wise investment for the future. We've seen the emergence of three new coronaviruses capable of human-human transmission in the past two decades (SARS in 2002, MERS in 2012 and SARS-CoV-2 in 2019), so we are certain to see more viruses like SARS-CoV-2 to emerge in the future. mRNA vaccine technology has shown itself to be one of the better options for rapidly developing effective vaccines for emerging diseases.

 

[bhobba]

Without doubt. In fact, I also think a third vaccine manufacturing facility needs to be constructed. We could start manufacturing the Novavax vaccine ready for when it likely will be approved. I was advocating another two at the beginning of the pandemic. These are new vaccines - it was nearly certain even after the stringent stage 3 trials were completed, issues were sure to arise - which has proven to be the case. We spent trillions making sure the Aus economy did not collapse with the extreme Covid measures we took. They worked, but we now have by a large margin the highest Covid related debt of any country in the world. Out of those trillions, they could have spent, say 100 million, on two new facilities that could turn a profit over the coming years. It would be a smart investment.

CSL is churning out over 1 million doses a week of the Oxford vaccine since March 22 - and was making it before then as well. But we have only about 1.5 million vaccinated. So production is not the problem; distribution is. The restriction on not using the AZ for the under '50s has now been lifted. If worried, the advice is to discuss the risk vs reward with your doctor. As yet, we have no mass vaccination hubs etc. but are working on it. Considering Covid is basically eliminated in Aus that makes sense - we are in no hurry really. Even though our PM (Scotty from marketing as he is called here) says we are now on a war footing . So far, it looks more like Dad's Army than D-Day.

Thanks
Bill