Predictions of when international flights may resume/bans lifted

[CityRail]

''The Prime Minister announced the new figure of how many Australians have returned home from overseas.

"The figures on December 30 was that 63,109 Australians were able to get home by the end of the year from September 18," he said.

"As you know, that is more than double the number we had as our target of just around 26,000 back in September.''

So 63000/14 = average of 4,500/week returning

Dec beginning, they said 36,000 aussies still wanting to return home. So say 16K have come back in December. At this rate, backlog could be cleared by February ?

Then perhaps we can start to have international students arriving back in Australia and rescue the HE sector?

 

[jakeseven7]

I would call the move absolutely idiotic, and many doctors in the UK agree.

Absolutely desperate... the UK is a disaster...

 

[hb13]

It's going to blow up in our faces? Before the catastrophe happens? Erm.... perhaps we're experiencing a different life in the UK, but IMHO it's already blown up and we're living out that catastrophe!

What I was trying to say is that we haven't seen anything yet. We currently stand at having the worst number of new daily cases ever, and close to the highest deaths per day since this all started. We have just had Xmas and New Years', arguably the biggest UK holidays (no thanksgiving here) and people haven't really followed the rules anyway, so there is no doubt we are about to see things get much worse.

So yes, I'm in the UK seeing the same things, and while you can sit there and squabble over the meaning of disaster/catastrophe, that is not my point. My point is that things are going to get much worse, pandemic wise and economically. Furthermore, the government has two approved vaccines and has decided to ignore the science and data and give people one shot, then the second shot 3 months later - which may render these vaccines absolutely useless.

 

[hb13]

''The Prime Minister announced the new figure of how many Australians have returned home from overseas.

"The figures on December 30 was that 63,109 Australians were able to get home by the end of the year from September 18," he said.

"As you know, that is more than double the number we had as our target of just around 26,000 back in September.''

So 63000/14 = average of 4,500/week returning

Dec beginning, they said 36,000 aussies still wanting to return home. So say 16K have come back in December. At this rate, backlog could be cleared by February ?

What about the Aussies leaving Australia and coming back? I think that number is around 100k from March - Aussies who have been granted special exemptions to leave, therefore, also needing to come back.

Obviously we don't have an exact number of the net amount of Australians returning home, but it is a small rate. I see the backlog not being cleared before Q3 2021. Some may just wait till borders open up again with a vaccine required some time in late 2022.

 

[Pushka]

Even though I hate to say it, 2021 may arguably be worse than 2020. If you look at the US and the UK, who both now have 2 vaccines approved each, vaccination numbers are significantly lower than expected (US 2.8 M vs target 20 M, UK 600k vs target 'millions' by end of 2020).

To add to this, the UK has now effectively switched to a 1-dose regime because of how slow the vaccination process is. Pfizer has come out and said that after 21 days from the first dose, there are no data showing someone is protected. There has been no transparency whatsoever about why they're doing this - people are suspecting it is because of how slow the vaccination process is. Being based in the UK, it is clear the UK government has absolutely no clue what it is doing. The way things are going here, this disaster is about to blow up in all our faces.

The current vaccination is very difficult to implement. The Oxford one should improve things drastically.

 

[burmans]

If they refuse vaccine then they should left with their own risk. We cannot wait anymore to open our borders because of a minority group that hinders us from leaving!

Aren’t you one of this group refusing to vaccinate?

 

[Hvr]

Then perhaps we can start to have international students arriving back in Australia and rescue the HE sector?

Maybe in 2022, possibly 2023.

It could be argued that the HE sector was more damaged by the way that (then) international students were essentially abandoned and left to starve.

The trust has gone and will be very hard to regain.

I wonder how many academics have pivoted to another career?

 

[Pom-DownUnder]

The Gov expects vaccinations to be complete by then and they said they are not opening borders until everyone gets vaccinated.

link / source? I have not seen anything where they said they would not open borders until everyone was vaccinated

 

[Pom-DownUnder]

Aren’t you one of this group refusing to vaccinate?

I believe CityRail has hit most of the stances, pro vaccine, just give it to other people, wont take it, wants to take it, doesnt want to get jabbed with a needle so would take it if its a pill, wants his family to have it, doesnt want his family to have to take it.

think i've covered most of their stances, but I guess any rail system must be a little unpredictable

 

[drron]

Then perhaps we can start to have international students arriving back in Australia and rescue the HE sector?

They have already started to arrive.

International students land in Australia, renewing hope for universities

A cohort of 63 international students touches down in Darwin from Singapore to commence two weeks' quarantine at the Northern Territory's Howard Springs facility.

www.abc.net.au

 

[Must...Fly!]

Absolutely desperate... the UK is a disaster...

Difference being that the vaccines are very good, it seems, even after one dose, at preventing serious disease requiring hospitalization.

Assuming that data continues to hold true then delaying a second does by 8 weeks would, assuming millions of doses available per week, result in millions more being protected from serious disease leading to hospitalisation.

A good outcome I would've thought.

 

[DC3]

... I'm in the UK the government has two approved vaccines and has decided to ignore the science and data and give people one shot, then the second shot 3 months later - which may render these vaccines absolutely useless.

Total amateurs making such decisions in the UK, not backed-up by any scientific data.

 

[33kft]

Difference being that the vaccines are very good, it seems, even after one dose, at preventing serious disease requiring hospitalization.

In the short term, but what's the point of a shot that might be half as effective over 21 days and then much less effective over the remaining 12 months vs taking the two shots? It's funny that none of this was questioned throughout 9 months of development and now apparently that second shot just isn't necessary (despite specific timings between the shots being prescribed previously) and those who are customers of the vaccine are now apparently in a position to determine specific dosages.

This wasn't part of the trials in the same way that halving the dosage and vaccinating double the people wasn't tested. At some point a baseline for efficacy has to be established and it seems winging half doses after a medical trial using two doses is less about surprises in effectiveness (since the efficacy seems to be just over 50% for a single dose vs high 90s for two doses) and more about an inability to administer the dose the way it was administered in the trials.

Good luck to those experimenting live with minimum effective dosages, I guess. Perhaps they can start experimenting around how much they can dilute the single dose to vaccinate more people from less vaccine? Have we tried experimenting with only vaccinating children once for MMR to save money? Something doesn't seem right here, if we've accepted that multiple shots are required for some types of vaccines for maximum efficacy in the past, how have the UK's medical agencies determined this is workable for a vaccine only just approved under emergency conditions, and with pfizer publically advising against this?

Bloomberg - Are you a robot?

People should get their shots on the recommended schedule, Pfizer said on Thursday, warning “there is no data to demonstrate that protection after the first dose is sustained after 21 days.”

“Data from the Phase 3 study demonstrated that, although partial protection from the vaccine appears to begin as early as 12 days after the first dose, two doses of the vaccine are required to provide the maximum protection against the disease, a vaccine efficacy of 95%,” Pfizer said in its statement.

I do note that Fauci in that same article above suggests that one dose may be sufficient, with the manufacturer stating that they don't recommend it, that it's only 50% effective, long term efficacy not known and that it will give people a false sense of security. Given the US finds themselves in the same situation as the UK (in crisis and way behind on vaccination schedule) perhaps there's a reason they're singing a similar tune. Again, good luck to them, but I can't see people in high risk groups with a single shot that is ~50% effective against COVID being very comforted with a veto of the remaining 50% effectiveness because the authorities can't ramp up administration of the vaccine.

 

[kamchatsky]

At the moment, I am guessing that international borders will open without quarantine for certain countries in mid 2022.

This is to take into account for most of the world to complete immunisation (say late 2021), as well as months allowed to observe the daily decrease of covid19 numbers, and the observation of the effectiveness of the various vaccine types.

Now this is only on assumption that all vaccines will be successful.

So whilst I was really keen to book some SQ J awards for my family of 4 for international travel over Xmas 2021 (plenty of availability), I have held back from doing this, and will wait for mid 2022 instead.

 

[hb13]

At the moment, I am guessing that international borders will open without quarantine for certain countries in mid 2022.

This is to take into account for most of the world to complete immunisation (say late 2021), as well as months allowed to observe the daily decrease of covid19 numbers, and the observation of the effectiveness of the various vaccine types.

Now this is only on assumption that all vaccines will be successful.

So whilst I was really keen to book some SQ J awards for my family of 4 for international travel over Xmas 2021 (plenty of availability), I have held back from doing this, and will wait for mid 2022 instead.

I hate to say it, but I agree. I think Xmas 2021 will hopefully be better than Xmas 2020 - but not enough to have quarantine free travel to a majority of countries worldwide.

Vaccinations are moving much slower than expected or hoped and also we need to think about poorer countries which have no idea when they'll even be able to receive the vaccine.

 

[hb13]

Difference being that the vaccines are very good, it seems, even after one dose, at preventing serious disease requiring hospitalization.

Assuming that data continues to hold true then delaying a second does by 8 weeks would, assuming millions of doses available per week, result in millions more being protected from serious disease leading to hospitalisation.

A good outcome I would've thought.

There is no evidence of this whatsoever, as Pfizer have said. They have explicitly said that there is no data showing any type of effectiveness after 21 days from first dose.

So how does delaying the second shot to 9 weeks after this make any sense?

My cousin is based in Paris and works in a hospital that looks at Covid-19 patients and tries to analyse trends and similarities in patients based on symptoms. He explained why things are such a disaster to me: 'all the decisions being made (in Europe/UK/US), from Day 1 have been political, not scientific'.

A very simple example is economics. Politicians don't seem to understand the key principle that the virus needs to be shut down for the economy to return to normal. If you keep making decisions where you're trying to think of the economy first, it doesn't make sense because the virus will continue its rampage and the economy will end up being screwed anyway - a perfect example is the UK.

 

[Must...Fly!]

I wouldn't say there is no evidence for it. The Oxford AZ vaccine trial had no participants develop severe disease after one dose. That is encouraging, and if you're desperate....

 

[hb13]

I wouldn't say there is no evidence for it. The Oxford AZ vaccine trial had no participants develop severe disease after one dose. That is encouraging, and if you're desperate....

The Oxford/AZD vaccine has a lot of issues - for a start no one even knows what the correct dosage for optimal protection is. Secondly, there has been no clear answer to what the effectiveness is. This is why it has struggled to be approved in the US and elsewhere. It has finally gotten approval in the UK - but the UK is desperate.

If the UK government had said they're administrating one dose for the Oxford vaccine, you would understand possibly - however to do this on both vaccines is ridiculously incompetent, wasteful and just crazy. Also, it is important to note that the Pfizer vaccine and the Oxford vaccine are two completely different vaccines. So dosage amounts and frequencies can't just be standardised for them as the UK government has decided to do.

 

[drron]

The Oxford/AZD vaccine has a lot of issues - for a start no one even knows what the correct dosage for optimal protection is. Secondly, there has been no clear answer to what the effectiveness is. This is why it has struggled to be approved in the US and elsewhere. It has finally gotten approval in the UK - but the UK is desperate.

If the UK government had said they're administrating one dose for the Oxford vaccine, you would understand possibly - however to do this on both vaccines is ridiculously incompetent, wasteful and just crazy. Also, it is important to note that the Pfizer vaccine and the Oxford vaccine are two completely different vaccines. So dosage amounts and frequencies can't just be standardised for them as the UK government has decided to do.

You haven't read the peer reviewed literature then.The Oxford vaccine stacked up pretty well.

The Lancet: Oxford COVID-19 vaccine is safe and protects against disease, first published results from phase 3 trials

Interim results of the Oxford COVID-19 vaccine trials find that the vaccine protects against symptomatic disease in 70% of cases - with vaccine efficacy of 62% for those given two full doses, and of 90% in those given a half then a full dose (both trial arms pre-specified in the pooled...

www.eurekalert.org

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)32661-1/fulltext

There are as many questions with the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines.Just one example.no serious allergic reactions occurred in the trials.It was only later that this arose.As they are a new vaccine technology in humans there has to be at least a little concern that more unexpected side effects will ultimately be revealed.
And originally the Oxford vaccine trial was going to be one dose only.

 

[Must...Fly!]

Good point regarding the mRNA shots. I personally wouldn't be terribly keen on taking any of them, at least at this point, but I'd be a lot more comfortable with the Oxford one because it is known technology at least.