Science by Fiat: Can We “Order” that a Vaccine be Made by a Deadline?
The hype around vaccines becoming available quickly is feeding off everyone’s desperation for the Covid-19 pandemic to go away so that normalcy can return. False hope can lead to reckless behaviour, and bitterness when the vaccine “does not arrive as promised”.
We must remember that vaccines are injected into healthy bodies and therefore must be assessed for safety and side effects. These steps cannot be “fast tracked”. If adverse side effects are present even in just 1 or 2% of the population (or if the vaccine does not work for a similar number percentage of people) the numbers that will be at the risk of sickness or death will be huge when the vaccine is given to billions of people (1% of 1 billion is 10 million!). It is important to know what these side effects are and what this number is before a vaccine can be mass administered.
The path is long and tortuous. Saying this is not about “negativity” but realism. There are no “quick and near to safe” solutions [See reader comments on article link.][July 2020]
