Editor

Why has the AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine, approved last week by the MHRA, become the preferred protection of vulnerable people by the Welsh Government?

At the beginning of the month the Welsh Government said that priority groups – including the over-80s – would begin to receive the Pfizer vaccine, with its 95 per cent efficacy, perhaps before Christmas. Indeed, on 23 December Elin Jones MS reported that the Hywel Dda Health Board had vaccinated6,000 NHS and care workers, who rightly have top priority.

But we over-80s appear to have been demoted, with the Welsh Government preferring the AstraZeneca option with its significantly lower efficacy of 62 per cent. No explanation has been given for the switch. Meanwhile in England over-80s are already being given the Pfizer.

The AstraZeneca had 62 percent efficacy in their largest trial, of 11,636 people, but although 90 per cent efficacy in a small additional sub-group in the UK numbering 2,741 who were given a half dose of the vaccine, followed by a whole dose four weeks later, gave a combine defficacy of 70.4 per cent, MHRA has approved only the two full doses regime.

AstraZeneca chief executive Pascal Soriot has suggested that further data submitted to the regulator showed the vaccine could match the 95 per cent efficacy achieved by the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines. “We think we have figured out the winning formula and how to get efficacy that, after two doses, is up there with everybody else,” he said.

But the “winning formula” has not yet been revealed, so we are left with 62 per cent protection.

Such odds would hardly encourage vulnerable people to mingle freely in society, so self isolation would remain the order of the day.

The flu vaccine offers“protection”, but in the 15years or so my wife and I have received it we have contracted flu three times; an inconvenience but nothing more, a headache, a sniffle. Just one failure of the AstraZeneca vaccine – only slightly more effective than a flu vaccine – and we are in real trouble, a bit more than a sniffle.

Why the change in policy by the Welsh Government? AstraZeneca has said that its vaccine will cost the government “the same as a cup of coffee”, about £3.Pfizer costs about £20. So surely this switch is not a financial consideration in such a vital matter as public safety? Or is the Pfizer too difficult to handle, with its requirement of very low temperature?

Surely human lives are not being evaluated in pounds?

Lionel FitzGerald Llangorwen Aberystwyth

Have your say on the local issues affecting you - email [email protected] or join in the conversation on our Facebook page