[gambiting]

>>Why do people keep saying this?

Because the population on HN is not homogeneus and different regions in the world approach the flu vaccine differently? In some countries it's completely free and it's normal to get it every year, and even in some countries where it isn't, there's only a nominal cost and usually the employer covers it - so most people get the flu shot too. Not a big deal at all.

>> they have always been reserved for the sick and elderly

See above. Maybe that's true where you live.

>> instead of shots, do these pharmaceutical companies not prioritise developing an effective at home treatment for the symptoms of Covid-19

Why not both? Treatment for symptoms is under development, as well as vaccine which you take with an inhaler at home. Or would you rather that they stopped the development of vaccines completely and focused just on the treatment of symptoms?

[thaufeki]

>>Or would you rather that they stopped the development of vaccines completely and focused just on the treatment of symptoms?

No, but surely it would be easier to produce an antiviral for home use that would alleviate the symptoms of Covid-19, rather than relying on the development of a vaccine, and then demanding almost universal uptake for it to work?

Then we could have had vaccines for the sick, elderly, immunocompromised and whoever else wanted them after a while, and treatment of symptoms for everyone else.

We knew, pretty much from the beginning, that Covid was here to stay. I would like to know what the path out of this pandemic is now, now that we still aren't discussing treatment and are talking about additional boosters.

[jacquesm]

That's the equivalent of 'a mere matter of engineering'. Developing anti-viral drugs is hard, for plenty of viruses we have vaccines but no anti-virals, for RNA based viruses (which mutate rapidely) anti-virals are even harder.

[thaufeki]

Thank you. I'm not aware of the complications of developing an anti-viral for this disease (and I'm not going to go into the debate around existing anti-virals). I did not intend to be dismissive of the effort involved. I'm coming at it from a place of real frustration.

I can't see how this pandemic ends without an effective treatment.

[jacquesm]

It may not end.

We missed the 'golden window' early on in the epidemic when (for instance like SARS-CoV) it could have been contained. But now we have a real problem. The big difference between SARS-CoV and COVID-19 is that the former first gives you symptoms and then makes you contagious and with COVID-19 it is the other way around. That simple fact alone possible made it impossible to contain this. But we never really tried (except for a very few countries).

[grioghar]

Yeah, I had a real hard time with this at the beginning, knowing how people behave.

Trying to be as apolitical as possible here, but the leadership flopped hard and wrong here, and…well…welcome to the endemic reality.

As an aside: the World of Warcraft model was more accurate than most would have expected.

[Toutouxc]

> surely it would be easier to produce an antiviral for home use that would alleviate the symptoms of Covid-19, rather than relying on the development of a vaccine

What makes you think that? Honest question.

[thaufeki]

Vaccines are specific and usually take years to produce (this time being the exception), it was more of a question than a statement of fact because I genuinely don't know (hence the use of 'surely', it seems intuitive to me but I really can't say.)

[bmer]

Making an anti-viral is hard. No where near as easy as making an antibiotic (and even that can be hard, because: evolution).