JUSTIFYING A VACCINE AS ‘PWEDE NA YAN’
IT is undeniable that science has ways of vetting vaccines. Using this lens, the Philippine Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved for emergency use the Chinese-made vaccine CoronaVac developed by Sinovac Biotech. It is a vaccine that was developed from an inactivated CNO2 strain of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, created from Vero cells. It is to be administered in two doses 14 days apart. It requires storage in a place that is between 2 to 8 degrees Celsius and with an unknown lifespan.
However, the FDA in its first advisory imposed a restriction on the administration of the Sinovac vaccine, advising that it should not be used on health workers. This limitation is based on the undeniable fact that from among the known vaccines developed against the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19), CoronaVac has the lowest recorded efficacy at 50.4 percent 14 days after the second dose for those with mild symptoms, according to a test run in Brazil. Although it should also be mentioned that it showed an efficacy rate of 78 percent in mild to severe cases in the same test run, a higher efficacy rate of 65 percent in another test run in Indonesia, and a much higher rate in Turkey at 91.25 percent.
The only comparably low efficacy rate reported was that for PfizerBioNTech at 52 percent, but this was only after the first dose, and where the efficacy went as high as 94.6 percent seven days after the second dose. In addition, Pfizer-BioNTech has an 88.9 percent efficacy, while Sinovac does not have any published data on its efficacy against severe Covid-19, in addition to the fact that it has yet to publish the results of its phase 3 trials.
The FDA should be commended for being honest and truthful in its evaluation of Sinovac. Even if it may not have created a strong justification for the vaccine and may not have helped assuage the fears of those who are hesitant to be vaccinated, it at least provided a scientifically warranted truth. After all, a 50.4 percent efficacy rate may not be high, but still falls within the acceptable limit provided by the World Health Organization (WHO). Thus, providing this information is not only fair, but in accordance with the very fundamental right of every individual to be fully informed of the limitations of any product, even if it is a vaccine against a deadly disease, to be used as a guide in deciding whether to get vaccinated or not.
What is unnerving, however, is the very palpable attempt on the part of government functionaries, including even those in the medical field, to recast and reframe this truthful assessment of the vaccine. Thus, and after being restricted for use by the FDA, CoronaVac was given a green light by another medical regulatory body, the National Immunization Technical Advisory Group (Nitag), for it to be now used even by medical health workers. What Nitag’s decision intended to do was to effectively boost the confidence of people in the vaccine despite its lower efficacy rate, even as it may have intensified the confusion about the science behind its safety. After all, it cannot be comforting to be vaccinated by a brand with a much lower efficacy rate, barely just edging by a mere 0.4 percent the lower limit of the WHO safety standard. But it is even worse when scientific bodies end up having conflicting assessments about how to interpret what is objectively determined by science.
And this is where it becomes patently politicized. Perhaps desperate about being labeled for a while as the wallflower, left out as the last Southeast Asian country without a vaccine, or stung by the criticisms about the slow-paced vaccine rollout that we end up being outpaced even by Bangladesh and Afghanistan, we were badly in need of redemption. One cannot but be amazed at the epic contrast between the missteps associated with other vaccines, from allegations of dropping the ball on their procurement to a belated realization about an indemnity agreement, that caused delays in their delivery, to the speed by which CoronaVac’s delivery was almost instantly concluded just days after an emergency use authorization was issued.
Indeed, even Anthony Fauci has argued that any vaccine would be better, as long as these are authorized and vetted by scientific bodies using WHO standards. There is scientific validity to argue that any approved protection is better than not having one at all.
But this valid line of defense is ruined and tainted by the kind of reasoning that is deployed by government functionaries in relation to CoronaVac.
What is making the promotional spectacle appear contrived and patently egregious are the reasons used by drumbeaters in trying to ramp up support for the vaccine brand from China. Instead of focusing on a scientific warrant and simplifying this for it to be understandable to ordinary citizens, what we hear are arguments that are downright ill-conceived, if not idiotic. Some claim that CoronaVac is the best vaccine because it is the only one available. Others, including the vaccine czar himself, Carlito Galvez Jr., point out that it is the best because it is the first to arrive. And those who are hesitant are being told to stop being too choosy.
When juxtaposed with the fact that CoronaVac barely passed WHO standards and ranks poorly in relation to other vaccines in terms of published efficacy, these kinds of reasoning only highlight the vaccine’s handicaps. You cannot assuage the fears of people against vaccines, more so that they have barely recovered from the trauma and fear brought about by the Dengvaxia hysteria and debacle, by telling them that they should not be choosy about a product that may not be the best in the market but is the only one available. We cannot ask people to overcome their fears and doubts about vaccines by telling them “puwede na ‘yan.”