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Comment by bpodgursky | Hacker News Reader

You're really missing that these prescribed regimes aren't some long-tested, optimized plan. The vaccine manufacturers literally had one chance to guess what the right application schedule was, and had one chance to do clinical trials on them.

Because they NEEDED the vaccine to work, they chose very conservative numbers. Multiple doses, high loads, super cold temperatures, etc. Those trials have produced a lot of strong corollary evidence that partial vaccinations work, but it will take a very long time to do a full set of clinical trials on those doses.

And in the interim, a lot of people will die, who probably would have lived had we proceeded with 1-shot vaccinations. There's a lot of risk here either way, and choosing and never modifying the original dose schedule is not "safer" -- it's just a bias towards inaction.

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I’m not missing any point. They picked what they could initially prove and the FDA expands on this to say that yes, we could try some other variables in further clinical trials.

It’s time to start injecting people, and to stop bullshitting around it. The vaccine is not effective immediately, we’re still going to have to continue social distancing and practicing better than usual hygiene and masking for most of us. You want to save lives? Be responsible instead of advocating for reckless changes to vaccine dosages. Continue to wear your mask, continue to practice good hygiene, continue to keep your distance until such a time as herd immunity is achieved. These aren’t even the only vaccines in the pipeline, just the two authorized by the FDA thus far and Pfizer, Moderna and FDA can continue clinical trials to see if they can lighten up on the dosage requirements down the line.

> The vaccine manufacturers literally had one chance to guess what the right application schedule was, and had one chance to do clinical trials on them.

Couldn't they have done additional arms in the trial? Moderna could have had a trial arm with 1 mcg doses.

This is what I don't understand... why didn't we run several parallel studies for different dosages and time frames? I highly doubt there was a shortage in the pool of people willing to sacrifice themselves.

Because the trial sizes would need to be similar, so now you’re trialing you recruit 120,000 people across 4 trials.

How long would that delay trial results you think?

Is it a requirement that they end at the same time? I would have volunteered.

No, but in order not to delay your main trial, you’d have to delay recruitment for the others or else your competing against yourself for patients.

And if they just delayed the other dosing arms, we’d be in the same spot we are now anyways - waiting for more data.

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