Originally Posted by
rickair7777
They know what they're doing, statistically speaking. The trail result was 100% prevention of severe cases.
IIRC in statistics extreme results are much more likely to have a tight margin of error, than middle of the road results.
Also your "11 cases" logic is a complete falacy... what they ACTUALLY had was 15,000 vaccine recipients, NONE of who got severe covid. For the severe covid metric it's statistically irrelevant how many got mild covid. I'm assuming but don't know that the study group was split 50/50 between vaccine and placebo, if not I'm sure it was fairly close.
I’m not sure I agree 100% with your statistical work there, Rick. Yes, they had 15000 vaccine recipients none of whom got severe COVID, but the statistical EXPECTATION wasn’t for 15,000 vaccine recipients to get severe covid because the control group ALSO had 15,000 placebo recipients of which over 14,805 didn’t get COVID AT ALL.
So based upon the control, the statistical expectation is that only about 180 people would have been sufficiently exposed to get COVID, versus the 11 people who actually got it. And that is admittedly pretty good efficacy.
now of the 180 controls (placebo group) who actually got the disease, only 30 met the prechosen criteria for ‘serious’ cases - approx 17% including one fatality. So given that the immunized group only HAD 11 infected, the expectation based upon the control group is that they would have had 17% x 11 or roughly two serious cases.
The fact that they “should” have had 2 and only had zero is all well and good, but it has about the same statistical likelihood as flipping a coin and getting heads twice in a row, and certainly doesn’t justify a claim of 100% effective without at least the qualifier “so far.”
I would personally be delighted if - as a larger ‘n’ is gathered - this continues to be the case and the confidence interval continues to be narrowed, but right now claiming 100% protection against serious cases is truly prognosticating in advance of the data, IMHO.
You are of course entitled to your differing opinion.