It really is feeling like 2009 again, we had Professor Neil Ferguson predicting a worst case scenario of 65000 deaths from swine flu, and a best case scenario of 3100 deaths. In the end swine flu killed 457 people. We had the brand new vaccine Pandemrix, given to 6M people in the UK. The vaccine had been approved by the European medicines agency for use across the EU, despite minimal clinical trials. The manufacturer, GSK was given an indemnity by the UK Government, yet a major study (after the event) by the UK Health Protection Agency (now PHE) found around one in every 55,000 jabs led to narcolepsy.
If memory serves from the Pfizer press release, their vaccine has been extensively tested on approximately 43,000 people.
If memory also serves, Pfizer set a record for the largest health care fraud settlement, and the largest criminal fine of any kind with 2.3Bn dollars in 2009.
And as a side note, Sir Patrick Vallance joined GSK in May 2006 as Head of Drug Discovery.
Forgive me for wanting more information to try and make a better informed decision, but all I am hearing on the news tonight is this is an apparent wonder cure.
Someone please show us the evidence, show us the numbers, show us the peer reviewed findings, not just hyberbole, not just one side of the debate.
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