Experts highlight ‘shaky’ science makes Australia’s Oxford-AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine choice questioned

On Monday night Australian time, the AstraZeneca-Oxford University vaccine candidate, one of the COVID-19 vaccines the Australian Government committed to in a multi-billion-dollar deal, released its first interim results from its phase 3 trials.

At first glance the results were lauded, with the company claiming one dosing option provided 90 per cent protection against COVID-19.

The Australian Government declared it a “very good result” that will help create a “fully safe Australia”.

But experts Dr Porges wasn’t convinced.

“We called it first,” he told the ABC.

“We said, ‘we think the company [AstraZeneca] has embellished the data’.

“And we said we didn’t think it will get approved in the US.

“People were incensed with our first statements, but I think as more information has come out, more people are in agreement with us.”

As this week rolled on, Dr Porges’ comments have been vindicated.

Pressure has been mounting on the company all week, with a stream of scientists and researchers across the world joining Dr Porges’ initial assessment.

Some labelled it “shaky science”, while others questioned the legitimacy of the data released by the company.

Now, critically, the regulators are becoming involved.

And the issue, it seems, all comes down to a curious mistake.

Vaccine development still ‘extraordinary’

Back in New York, Dr Porges said he was worried about how “consumer confidence” in vaccines would be impacted following AstraZeneca’s reporting this week.

“Confidence comes from transparency of communication and clarity of communication,” Dr Porges said.

“And I think AstraZeneca, at the very least, violated those two tenets. There was still time for the company to recover.”

And, like most people, he’s waiting patiently and with excitement for a vaccine to come.

Dosing by accident

The interim results of the phase 3 trial found the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine was 62 per cent effective in people who received two doses.

But when volunteers were given a half dose followed by a full dose, that efficacy shot up to 90 per cent.

The company later acknowledged that the half dose was a “manufacturing issue” and given to the trial participants by mistake.

It also revealed only 2,741 people had been given the half dose while 8,895 people received the two full doses.

Facing increasing pressure to clarify the data, AstraZeneca chief executive Pascal Soriot said on Friday it would now likely conduct a new global clinical trial to assess the vaccine’s efficacy.

However, he claimed he did not expect that to delay regulatory approval in Britain or the EU, despite the UK authorities on Friday openly questioning whether the vaccine meets “rigorous safety standards”.

In Australia, the Therapeutic Goods Administration makes decisions on the safety and efficacy of vaccines to be rolled out to the population.

It often guided by international approvals in the US and the UK and is currently assessing the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine — which the Government has committed to buying 33.8 million doses if approved — through what is known as “provisional determination”.