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Comment by abraxas | Hacker News Reader

I know this is published in the Lancet but the data is coming purely from Russia. While it’s still a data point of sorts I think it’s really prudent for the rest of the world to try and reproduce these results before taking them at face value.

Sorry but this data is coming from a totalitarian country where everything is directly or indirectly state controlled. I’m quite skeptical that the Kremlin didn’t put their thumb on the scales at least a little bit when compiling these results.

Since this vaccine is being sold left and right around the developing world we might in due course obtain more independent data about it. Until then it’s safer to say that the efficacy of this vaccine is basically unknown.

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I'm thinking more and more people will eventually realize that it's not so black and white: corruption is a matter of degree. Boeing getting the 737 Max past the FAA. Total inaction of the SEC on the stock market manipulation by the hedge funds. These cases show that corruption is alive and well in the USA. Is there less corruption than in Russia? Sure. But human societies the world over have similar ailments, and corruption is one of them. Sticking on labels is harmful whether it is done to sick people or countries.

I’m not sure that you understand your own position. Yes, corruption is a spectrum. Color values are a spectrum. Politics is a spectrum. Two examples on a spectrum are not equivalent because they’re on the same spectrum, if that’s what you’re implying. The spectrum itself exists to make distinctions between the cases that lie on it. You can’t claim equivalence between all cases on the same spectrum by that fact alone.

Though giving quite a show, Trump ended up leaving his place and Boden or his collaborators never were arrested for not showing up at the police station while in a coma. Putin just showed the world he is of a different advice.

Sure, nothing is black or white, but that doesn't mean that some shades are way darker than others.

Yes, Putin by arresting Navalny or "killing Magnitsky" is showing the world that he is way darker than, for example, G.W.Bush whose sins [1] just pale in comparison.

I agree though that corruption on all levels is a systematic problem in Russia that is not getting better.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Iraq_War

There are levels of corruption in all countries. But some we trust less in certain areas.

Russia has also engaged in the most sophisticated Olympic doping regimen in history. These guys' corruption knows no bounds. It's a culture of dishonesty.

You just made an insulting generalization about a country of 150M people

Don't confuse Russians with Russia.

why does it say Russia and culture though? Saying this is culture based on what Russian government is doing is like saying American culture is about grabbing women by a p*ssy based on Trump's behaviour.

I don't believe they were the only ones. Maybe the most sophisticated, but Jamaica for example, doesn't even have to be sophisticated about it ;)

There is a certain cycle team that comes to mind as well.

Absolute power corrupts absolutely

> But human societies the world over have similar ailments, and corruption is one of them

I think the point is that some societies are BUILT on corruption. It's not the same as places where there's a bit of corruption in somewhat functioning bureaucracies.

Not sure how your whataboutism invalidates the concern.

I share your skepticism. That said, Russia and the Soviet Union before have a long history in virus and phage research. They've been leaders in phage therapy [1], for example. Their expertise in this area may not be so far-fetched. Also [2].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phage_therapy

[2] https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/24/world/europe/vaccine-repu...

I don't think the Sputnik V vaccine has any substantive relationship to phage research and therapy. And I don't think there's much reason to doubt that Russian researchers could develop a solid vaccine, if only because it's difficult to say with strong confidence which approaches would definitely fail. Rather, it's a question of whether they actually did given the political dynamics. There's good reason to discount the credibility of claims coming from authoritarian regimes. (Reasons for which most Americans have a renewed appreciation, rightly or wrongly.)

I suspect it wouldn't be too difficult to fudge the numbers (e.g. candidate selection criteria) in such a way that a mediocre vaccine looks excellent. Until it's reproduced or until other opportunities for falsification arise, trusting a result is largely a matter of the personal credibility of the researchers and, importantly, the system in which they operate.

I just want to say that for us living in 3rd world countries (South America) the same distrust is held both to russian state sponsored vaccine and the billionaires owned private companies like Pfizer.

I think that its mostly due to the far-rigth dictatorships supported by USA in the whole continent.

So, in the same way USA citizens look at Russia we look at USA.

The study is published in one of the worlds premier medical journals. I am guessing it was peer reviewed by qualified people who likely thought of where the data is coming from.

It’s totally fine to question the data. I’m simply pointing out that it takes some effort to get published in the Lancet. I doubt that any of the participants would like the ignominy of publishing a fake research and being a pariah for the rest of their lives.

Dismissing the data just because it came from Russia seems excessive to me. It’s quite possible that they were successful despite not having gone through the FDA certification process.

This is the same peer reviewed medical journal that “peer reviewed” a paper based on obviously fake surgisphere data.

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6...

Kindof seems like those “peers” are human beings who are capable of reviewing things in the direction of their priors.

Do I expect them to be correct all of the time? No.

Do I expect them to be correct most of the time? Absolutely.

No journal is immune to being manipulated by skewed data. They (Lancet) in particular never truly lived down the vaccine-autism link fiasco. But again, I’m not going to declare that this data is cooked but I think it behooves us to approach it with a bit of skepticism. More so than if it were coming from a more trustworthy country.

Imo, as long as we can reasonably trust the data that it is safe, we should give it to as many people as we can. When it later turns out not to be particularly effective we can still use a second vaccine. It's not like the Oxford vaccine is all that effective.

> I’m quite skeptical that the Kremlin didn’t put their thumb on the scales at least a little bit

does this incentive magically not exist for... private for-profit businesses? Why in the public imagination is it always ever only states to which this kind of reasoning applies

There's something called regulation in other countries, and competition. Not like some countries where businesses are selected by governments.

Agreed. I looked at the list of countries it is approved in and said I trust NONE of those countries. Lets find a country which has reviewed it where I find them to be at least somewhat trustworthy.

That dataset is biased. Russia is under numerous sanctions and no western country will consider sputnik due to political pressure, even when licensing vaccine from Russia would benefit EU, as an example, currently missing the timely delivery of tens of millions of doses.

>even when licensing vaccine from Russia would benefit EU

Sanctions would have no point if they were abandoned whenever they would benefit the sanctioning country. Most (arguably all) trade between the EU and Russia would benefit the EU too, but the belief is that the harm to Russia is more severe and more likely to bring about political and diplomatic changes.

https://spacenews.com/amendment-to-senate-bill-allows-contin...

While I share your concerns about the government, and was suspicious of the numbers (heck, more than suspicious, I dismissed them out of hand), the more data that we see the more reasonable they seem. Using two different adenoviruses was, in retrospect, a pretty brilliant choice to increase the boost give by the second dose. I think it's entirely reasonable that this would give an additional 10-20% efficacy over other adenovirus vaccines.

I don't pretend to know how involved the Russian government was in the process, but it's a shame the scientists who designed this vaccine are tainted by the corrupt government of the country they live in.

No question that Russia has some of the best minds in the world, still. But a big headline product like this would be incredibly tempting for the regime to exaggerate the efficacy of for propaganda reasons. That’s not to say the vaccine is not brilliant. It’s just that I’d say we still have insufficient evidence to assert that it is.

The good money is on it being an exemplary vaccine.

The Sputnik name and the glowing data we’ve heard about it.

Besides, it’s not like you can trust big pharma only if has a Western brand slapped on it. Some of the worst drugs, possibly all of them (that I’m aware of), came from us.

> The good money is on it being an exemplary vaccine.

What do you mean by "the good money?" When I think of supposedly savvy investors backing biotech, I think Theranos.

> The Sputnik name and the glowing data we’ve heard about it.

Your justification is the name itself, and the data that OP is questioning. I don't know if it's a good vaccine or not, but I don't find this convincing. And after the Russian government went to such ridiculous lengths to cheat during the Olympics, I think it's fair to question their data.

Alrighty. You’re entitled to a contrary opinion. Not much to add beyond that.

All we can do is see how this shakes out.

I was genuinely asking. What is "the good money" because I truly have no idea what you mean.

I also don't understand why the name is relevant. At least in the US, things with patriotic names - aka the Patriot Act - are almost always obvious propaganda attempts.

Can’t say I’m too much into internet arguments.

It was a turn of phrase. The good money is a good bet, i.e. I think a tenable and wise position would be to believe what I do, but understand if you do not and recognize my own propensity to be wrong.

As for the name, I felt immediately that it was significant because I knew Russia wouldn’t stake so much national pride on it if it was a dud. Indeed, the evidence coming in seems to suggest that it isn’t, so I feel doubly confident in that assessment.

That’s all.

Fair. I was antagonistic. Thank you for the reply.

If some western countries start to purchase it, we will see much better behavior by the approved suppliers.

I will be ok with getting even the sputnik vaccine; I will be ok with J&J, Pfizer or Moderna or whatever that is approved. They are playing games in distributing the vaccines though. They are selling vaccines that they don't plan to distribute while playing territorial wars.

As opposed to USA companies having data come from outside USA?

Russia had been first to market in August, yet most of the richly developed countries held out for an American company to give them a vaccine.

Russia didn’t have enough resources to even distribute it to their own people back then.

What a waste for Russia, as usual, with both PR, mindset and completely botched worldwide sales campaign. And so many people could have been already helped around the world.

Meanwhile the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines have a huge fawning press telling people a ton of “maybes” and saying basically nothing concrete but urging everyone and their dog to get it, even if they have antibodies, cause you know, stuff and maybe and trust us this is better! Here is a typical example of the cringe:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/brucelee/2020/12/24/should-you-...

Your body normally doesn’t have anything like these little spikes. So the spike protein appearing inside your body can be like a Kanye West fan appearing at a Taylor Swift fan party. Or cottage cheese inside a hot dog. Your immune system then is supposed to say, “hey, this doesn’t belong here,” and generate a response to the spike protein.

By exposing your immune system to a very specific component of the virus, your immune system may be better able to focus specifically on this component, rather than fire off in random directions when it first encounters the virus in a natural infection. This could then potentially lead to a stronger and more persistent immune response than what may occur after a natural infection. Since the immune system is rather complex, more studies are needed to confirm this possibility.

“We have no clue so you gotta get this drug now!! $$$”

> Russia had been first to market in August, yet most of the richly developed countries held out for an American company to give them a vaccine.

They held out for something else because the Russian vaccine had undergone no phase III trials yet. It had only undergone phase I and II trials, which just test whether it is safe to give to people, not whether it actually does anything helpful.

It's not like Russia embarked on a massive project of vaccinating 150 million people in November. The manufacturing capacity was not yet there.

The vaccine underwent Phase I and II safety trials, and was thought to be safe. Russia than began directing the limited quantities being manufactured towards at-risk health care workers, while they ran efficacy trials.

There's nothing magical, or ordained by God that says we must run an efficacy trial with 30,000 individuals. By early January, Russia had only administered a couple hundred thousand doses.

In retrospect, it's highly likely this would have been the correct approach in all vaccines so far in use. In the middle of a pandemic, there's a very strong argument that should be vaccinating as quickly as possible after Phase II trials are complete, before waiting for a long-running efficacy trial. As you said, efficacy trials are not testing for safety. There's already a huge risk to individuals and to society from the virus itself.

What about the vaccines that made it through phase I and II trials fine, but then in phase III were found to not be very effective? That happened to GSK, Sanofi, and Merck (twice for Merck).

If vaccines were widely deployed after phase II with no proof they actually work, there would have be some that did not work that got widely used. The people that got them would they have immunity, and slack off on distancing and masking.

Once you did have a vaccine that you knew worked, there would probably be problems convincing those who got an ineffective vaccine that they need to come in again.

They may have different type of approvals I+II could be technically integrated .

FDA is not a universal regulator. Different countries can have different procedures.

phase 1 : 1-100 phase II 100-1000 phase III 1000-3000 https://d18x2uyjeekruj.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/201...

Russia is still more democratic than many of the US’s allies, and certainly more democratic than it was under Yeltsin. I don’t think it’s true that everything in Russia is state controlled.

Russia is making a vaccine, China is making two, India is also making one. India will also probably do a bulk of the manufacturing. We should be testing it all, including the western manufactured ones too.

Also it’s interesting that say a physics paper from China or Soviet Russia would not automatically be regarded as suspect.

There is no russia. There ia a large leftover of the USSR with autocratic criminal monarchy.

If you discount our allies in the EU, Japan, Canada, South Korea, and some Central and South American countries, then sure...?

I agree that Russia (USSR actually) produced first notch physics, but where did you get that Russia is more democratic now than under Yeltsin? Yeltsin's times were by far the most democratic there since 1917.

> Russia is still more democratic than many of the US’s allies

Russia is an authoritarian dictatorship with the same guy ruling for 21 years and counting. Which allies did you meant?

> and certainly more democratic than it was under Yeltsin

Under Yeltsin they had freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, separation of powers, state-independent business including large corporations, the federation, and independent press. Putin dismantled all of the above.

> a physics paper from China or Soviet Russia would not automatically be regarded as suspect

Russian government was caught cheating with doping tests of athletes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doping_in_Russia

> > Russia is still more democratic than many of the US’s allies

> Russia is an authoritarian dictatorship with the same guy ruling for 21 years and counting. Which allies did you meant?

Well, compare Russia to America's ally Saudi Arabia.

In Russia, they have national elections. You can complain they are rigged, and there is some truth in that – but, anyway, at least they have them. Saudi Arabia has never had an election in its history, except for local government.

I don't think the rigging in Russia is primarily through direct election fraud (although some of that may be happening). Putin is genuinely popular with a majority of Russians, so he can win a genuine majority of votes, but he engages in manipulation of public opinion through state-controlled media to help build his popularity. Also, the system ensures that the only people allowed to run against Putin are the communists and ultra-nationalists who are unlikely to win; pro-Western/liberal candidates are prevented from running, although it is not guaranteed they'd win if they were allowed, but they possibly could give Putin some more real competition. However, if Putin's popularity were to collapse, he'd be forced to resort to more blatantly fraudulent means to stay in power, and it is possible at that point his allies who keep him in power might turn against him and he might be removed.

In Russia, they have political parties. The system is dominated by the ruling "United Russia" party, although other parties (such as the Communist Party and the ultra-nationalist LDPR) are permitted to hold around a quarter of the seats in the Duma. Again, you can complain the Duma is rigged in United Russia's favour, and that complaint may well be true, but still doing better than Saudi Arabia, where political parties are banned.

It isn't just Saudi Arabia. Other American allies in the Middle East, such as UAE, Qatar and Oman also ban political parties.

> In Russia, they have national elections.

In Soviet Union they had them as well: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elections_in_the_Soviet_Union Will you argue USSR was a democracy?

> Putin is genuinely popular with a majority of Russians

We don’t quite know that.

> he'd be forced to resort to more blatantly fraudulent means to stay in power

That already happened in 2011 and in all the later ones: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_Russian_legislative_elect...

That helped him to stay in power, but only to an extent.

Unfortunately, he decided to resort to even more sinister means to stay in power, military offence against a neighbor country. Apparently, land grab of Crimea boosted his popularity by a lot back in 2014. Only recently the effect has started to fade away, likely a result of macro-economic consequences of international sanctions.

> Other American allies in the Middle East, such as UAE, Qatar and Oman also ban political parties.

Still, that’s 4 countries out of about half of the world. That’s not many of them.

> Will you argue USSR was a democracy?

Contemporary Russia has far more of the form of an electoral democracy than the USSR had. 25% of the Duma is controlled by opposition parties. How much of the Supreme Soviet was controlled by opposition parties?

If we distinguish form from substance, contemporary Russia has a lot of the form, but the substance is impaired. By contrast, the Soviet Union was lacking in both.

> We don’t quite know that.

The Nov 2020 Levada poll gave him a 65% approval rating – https://www.levada.ru/en/ratings/ – that seems to support what I said

> That already happened in 2011 and in all the later ones

Looking at that article about the 2011 election, United Russia was polling in the 50s to 60s, and won about 49% of the vote, suggesting they underperformed their polls. There may well have been some fraud, but unless the opinion polls are rigged too (which might be true, but where is the evidence?), it doesn't look like any fraud actually changed the outcome.

> Apparently, land grab of Crimea boosted his popularity by a lot back in 2014

Which seems to support what I said earlier, about him being "genuinely popular with a majority of Russians"

> 25% of the Duma is controlled by opposition parties.

An example, in 2014 100% of state senators (they have two houses in their parliament, duma is another one) approved Putin’s request to invade Ukraine. I think that level of conformity would be impossible with opposition parties there.

> 2020 Levada poll gave him a 65% approval rating

In modern Russia, saying you don’t support Putin or his party is risky. It’s not yet as bad as in USSR (the risk was almost 100% then, people were executed, imprisoned, or later forcibly treated in psychiatric hospitals), but it’s slowly getting there.

We don’t know how these same people would have responded if they would be free to express any opinion on the subject.

> it doesn't look like any fraud actually changed the outcome

In the first paragraph of that article there’s a statement “Statistical analysis of poll data have shown massive abnormalities that most researchers explain by mass-scale electoral fraud”, which has 6 external links.

> Which allies did you meant?

Saudi Arabia?

> Under Yeltsin they had freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, separation of powers, state-independent business including large corporations, the federation, and independent press.

And how much good did it do to people of Russia? I'd say that going the "democratic" way Russia would end up pretty much in the same place where Ukraine is now, and surely Russians would not want that. And thus maybe Russia way is actually more "democratic". We are learning quite a lot about democracy and free speech here too.

> Russian government was caught cheating with doping tests of athletes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doping_in_Russia

You've got a point here, although nowadays after "Russia interfered in election", "Trump colluded with Russia" etc., I am not sure if I can trust in what is being reported on many issues.

> Saudi Arabia?

Good point, any others? Because the claim was "many of the US’s allies", one example is not enough.

> And how much good did it do to people of Russia?

These people spent 70 years practicing and exporting communism. They suffered heavy military losses in Afghanistan. They have lost the cold war, and lost many dependent territories.

That's why their quality of life has dropped. Democratic freedoms and human rights did good for people.

> Good point, any others? Because the claim was "many of the US’s allies", one example is not enough.

Omitting usual suspects - Jordan is a monarchy.

> These people spent 70 years practicing and exporting communism. They suffered heavy military losses in Afghanistan. They have lost the cold war, and lost many dependent territories.

And adding "democratic" institutions like independent large businesses controlled by oligarchs, "free" press also controlled by oligarchs and "free" elections manipulated by oligarchs and external forces, "free" market economy w/o protectionism, was making the country into what Ukraine is today - just country divided into feudal domains controlled oligarchs in turn controlled by western elites.

> Democratic freedoms and human rights did good for people.

Look at the current state of Ukraine.

> Jordan is a monarchy

OK, that’s two out of how many? NATO alone has 30 states, that’s 29 excluding the US. Claiming these two are “many of the US’s allies” is dishonest.

> was making the country into what Ukraine is today

Quality of life, and economy, of Russia started to decline before the transition to democracy. Two main reasons were international sanctions for the war in Afghanistan (like Ronald Reagan’s security directive 75 in 1983), and collapse of oil prices around 1986.

Transition to democracy was not making the country into anything. Causations is directed from earlier to later events, never the other way around.

> Look at the current state of Ukraine.

The economy ain’t great because since 2014 Ukraine is losing many lives and resources defending Russian military aggression. In terms of democratic freedoms the country is way ahead: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy_Index

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