LittleGreyCat

The world is excited about the prospect of a new vaccine (or several) to counter Covid-19.

Do you think that everyone in NZ should be vaccinated?
It would allow free flow of tourists again because they couldn't infect the locals.

If it becomes available, will you be taking it?

Mishclark

Definitely, but I'm a healthcare worker so I would expect to and want to do it..

chocolate cake

So long as the virus is safe, yeah definitely.

Also not clear if any vaccine will give permanent cover, or temporary and need annual vax.

LittleGreyCat

Annual vaccination is still a better prospect than no vaccination, I assume.

Logistics is going to be the biggest problem.
You have to treat the whole population before the first to be vaccinated are due for their booster and from then on you are chasing your tail to make sure that everyone is covered.

This implies that you might not be able to open up the country until you are well into, or have completed, the first cycle.
Also only allow vaccinated travellers to enter.

Assuming that the vaccine is good for one year.
Population is around 4.8 million at the moment.
Assume 5.2 million for easier numbers.
You need to vaccinate 0.1 million people per week to do everyone in a year.
100,000 people a week.
Hmmm....if you work a 8 hour day 7 days a week (UK proposal is 12 hours per clinic) that gives you 56 hours per vaccinator.
Assume time off for coffee and a pee that gives you (for ease) 50 hours per week.
100,000 divided by 50 gives you.....2,000 dedicated vaccinators working flat out 8 hours a day 7 days a week 365/6 days a year.
Finger in the air says 3,000 to be sustainable with weekends, holidays, sick pay etc.
Add at least 2 support staff per head to do the booking in and other admin.

9,000 people full time with 2,000 Covid-secure locations.

I wonder how many trained people there are who can be spared from other health care duties, and how many suitable locations there are across NZ?
[Numbers, of course, subject to checking and the usual errors.]

jarv5116

those numbers your pumping out are crazy for NZ.
You don't need to vaccine 100% of the population in NZ to have an effect.
It will be the same as the Flu jab. the elderly and people with under laying health conditions and pregnant women are priority.
Then what ever is left vaccine wise people can have.
Your thinking along the lines of TB, polio and meningitis.
You need to think more Flu vaccine.
It's not the virus countries are worried about it's the healthcare system get over run with elderly and people with under laying health conditions the same as the Flu.

LittleGreyCat

Covid is nothing like the flu.
Far more deadly, very damaging for those with Long Covid.
The aim all along has been to develop herd immunity.
This requires at least 75% of the population to be immune, preferably far more.

It is akin to wiping out measles, polio etc.

Flu doesn't consume tissues like heart, lungs, liver, kidneys, pancreas, optic nerve, brain.
Flu doesn't leave cripples in its wake.
BMJ view of Long Covid

Numbers like 600,000 Long Covid sufferers have been quoted for the UK.
NZ won't have much experience of this because of the very low incidence of infection.

IMHO NZ doesn't want to expose the majority of the population to Covid-19 because it is "just like the flu".
NZ should be aiming for minimal infection.
Doing an outstanding job to date.

Is the general view that once you can immunise the elderly and very vulnerable you should just "let it rip"?

jarv5116

Its health care systems getting over run that's the problem.
99% of people on ICU wards are elderly and people with under laying health conditions that don't have a strong enough immune system to fight it.
6 people in my family have had it back home.
yes they were in bed for 2 weeks but recovered.
Its the elderly and people with conditions that need the vaccine.
Even if the vaccine is available do you think 100% will want to take it?
Its like now there one case and there ready for locking down Auckland

Charismatic

Unquarantined travel in three stages I'd imagine:
1. Travellers had the vaccination and it's still current. Then you pass a Covid-19 test before boarding the flight and upon arrival some time later (as per Department of Health recommendations.)
2. Travellers had the vaccination and it's still current.
3. The Department of Health provides guidance to the New Zealand Government that a high enough proportion of New Zealands population has been vaccinated to return to business as usual (ideally they'd have a plan to do this within Q1, 2021.)

Managed isolation should be continued at an appropriate scale until a commercially viable heat stable vaccine is available globally or we get to #3.

Charismatic

​​​​​​There is a balance to be struck. I think we have to recognise that not all of the population will opt to be immunised. Comes down to personal responsibility, the government can provide the vaccination service (and perhaps allow some reasonable interim period to roll that out), but can concurrently announce the resumption of normal border operations within a fixed time period (e.g. 30, 60 or 90 days). The government has a wider societal responsibility it needs to balance which takes into account not just healthcare but business and industry as well as the reunion of families with around a quarter of this countries population having been born abroad.

As I said I think that you'll find quarantine free travel will resume once the vaccine is rolled out as case-by-case people can prove they have been vaccinated prior to entry. It seems Western countries are looking at doing most of this work in Q1, 2021 (e.g. Germany already has contracts with Pfizer alone to provide the 90m vaccinations it requires to do it's entire population to be delivered in Q1.) However for other countries they will need to wait for a heat-stable vaccine (the WHO indicates that by the end of Q2, 2021 it expect vaccibes will be globally available.)

Be happy we live in a country wealthy enough to afford cold-supply chains and with the resources to vaccinate a large proportion of the population rapidly.

BEVS

As in compulsory? Not sure on that one.

... and certainly not for that .
I would prefer NZ really and truly rethinks its freeflow tourism thing to something of a little more discerning and exclusive product. We have been utterly overrun with manic tourists to the detriment of the land, its wildlife and in some cases our own lives. NZ needs more diversity.
In any case infected people should not be leaving their own land of residence. I find the attitude of the UK in this quite bizarre.

Not unless it is properly trialled and proven. I have seen what "almost proven" meds can do to a person. It was not good.

BEVS

I agree about healthcare systems. I will state though that coronavirus is nothing at all like the flu in any way other than to be contagious. Think more smallpox in dealing with this.

Bo-Jangles

I would fancy that NZs ability to deliver a couple of million vaccines in a short space of time is more doable than most other countries; last year 1.35 million doses of influenza vaccine were distributed and that's done in a relatively tight timeframe with all hands to the pump at GPs and Pharmacies and mass advertising campaigns to encourage folks to get vaxxed. Hospitals and health care centres can quite easily gear up with some additional clinic space and staff, much as they did for the Measles last year and this year for Covid testing with drive throughs and such like set up very quickly and without the usual fuss about how much it was costing.

Hospitals and GPs likely would prioritise their staff, the elderly and vulnerable, much as they did with flu vaccines this year as they were due around the same time when Covid-19 started to emerge.

chocolate cake

With the NZ governments elimination strategy, when a safe vaccine is available, I don't see how accepting say 2/3rds vaccination rate can fly.

You can argue until the cows come home about how debilitating it is, but there's little doubt that it's more contagious than flu, with catching it from lift buttons etc, and it spreading quickly. Doing that, would effectively be letting it rip.

Surely rates into the 90% are going to be needed, and some the anti-vaxers are going to need to come to the table.

Charismatic

You can't force someone of sound mind to be subjected to a medical treatment if they object. You can only inform them and discuss their concearns. However there will be some situations where it may be a prerequisite to avoid diseases spreading (e.g. attending school, rest homes etc.)

Usually as long as you get a high enough proportion of the population vaccinated the immunity it confers limits the scale of outbreaks as vaccination acts as a firebreak. The place where you might get issues is when you have a lot of people in close proximity who don't get immunised for some reason (e.g. a church with certain religious beliefs.)

chocolate cake

Can't you? if mask wearing can be enforced, I don't see why not practically .

Yep, it could be a requirement, to be able to claim any benefits, ACC cover, take a flight, etc.

Sure, we need to see it's safe, but then surely it's the only way we'll be able to open our borders again, We can't isolate North Korea or Albanian like for ever when the world returns to some kind of normality.

Otherwise we'll be having yet more of these lockdowns, South Australia months without community cases, now in almost martial lockdown for minimum 6 days, stay in the house and absolutely no exercise outdoors,
Vaccine cost will be enormous no doubt, but tiny in comparison to continual lockdowns, the partial Auckland CBD advised closure last Friday was estimated to cost $10 million

Anti-vaxers with the MMR vaccine and Dr Wakefield in the UK and the like, caused global vaccine scare with the resultant decrease in immunisation numbers and ultimately lead to increased measles cases which could have been avoided. Ultimately he was found to have personal interests, his work discredited and struck off the medical register.