Mixing doses - Canadians - Pfizer and AZ...

[Priorgirl]

On 7/16/2021 at 8:03 AM, kdr69 said:

John Heald spoke about this on his live chat this morning.  He said they are working on a communication to all who are affected by this which will identify what is needed.  This should be out shortly he said.

As one of the many Canadians that has the mixed AZ / Pfizer vaccine and is booked to sail on Carnival in March 2022 I'm hoping all of this will be resolved or a booster of Pfizer can be given to cover any travel requirements. I understand that my status at this moment isn't necessarily keeping me from sailing, however we are not spending all of this money to NOT be able to enjoy the port towns on our own and do excursions we want to do. Even at this, we would need to apply for the exemption that doesn't guarantee we'd even be approved to sail. We are a family of 9 with 3 cabins booked. I would hate to cancel this vacation that we have so looked forward to. I understand that RCC has lifted their restrictions regarding the mix and match vaccine....however I want to see how this plays out before I "jump ship". Fingers crossed. 

[Tomchick1970]

Check out this article on "AstraZeneca to seek U.S. approval of COVID vaccine in 2nd half".  Hopefully this happens and then they will accept our mixed cocktail.🤞

 

https://www.cp24.com/world/astrazeneca-to-seek-u-s-approval-of-covid-vaccine-in-2nd-half-1.5527441

[tert333]

This could the be the way the government may partially get themselves out of this mess that they created.  Israel is starting booster shots. 

 

https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/israel-covid19-booster-shot-seniors-1.6122683

 

Not sure if there would be enough pfizer/moderna to give the mix dose people a third shot in the fall.

[K_e_short]

45 minutes ago, tert333 said:

This could the be the way the government may partially get themselves out of this mess that they created.  Israel is starting booster shots. 

 

https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/israel-covid19-booster-shot-seniors-1.6122683

 

Not sure if there would be enough pfizer/moderna to give the mix dose people a third shot in the fall.

 

I can't the link now but I remember reading that about 1 million Canadians received AZ and Moderna/Pfizer.

[broberts]

3 hours ago, tert333 said:

This could the be the way the government partially get themselves out of this mess that they created.  ...

 

We live in a commonwealth in which health care is a provincial responsibility. In other words, no one government is responsible for the current situation.

 

I don't see a mess. What i do see are a number of people upset that decisions made to save lives have resulted in the need to hold off on cruising.

[tert333]

6 hours ago, broberts said:

 

We live in a commonwealth in which health care is a provincial responsibility. In other words, no one government is responsible for the current situation.

 

I don't see a mess. What i do see are a number of people upset that decisions made to save lives have resulted in the need to hold off on cruising.

 

I agree that the government made the decisions based on the assumption that they were doing it to save lives.  Many countries are taking a more scientific approach to the mixing of vaccines, including the UK.  Looking back at it, people made the decision to go with a mix, because our government (through NACI) recommended it.   We all relied on their judgement, as they were the experts.  At the time, there was limited test results on mixing and matching.  Whereas there were full clinical studies that showed the efficacy of the AZ vaccine taken as a complete package.

 

I believe that NACI, through this process kept flip flopping and sometimes contradicted Canada public health, to a point where someone made the decision that recommendations should flow through Canada public health, instead of directly from NACI.

 

We should look to NACI to do their due diligence before making recommendations.  They clearly jumped the gun as many reputable organizations such as the World Health and CDC, do not believe there has been enough testing to recommend mixing of doses. 

 

It is a mess as our Canadian health authorities made recommendations without having done a full analysis and understanding the impact of their decisions.  As a result, we became a group of test subjects proving the validity of mixing vaccines.  

 

Best intents does not translate into the best decision.

 

 

 

[Robjame]

7 hours ago, broberts said:

 

We live in a commonwealth in which health care is a provincial responsibility. In other words, no one government is responsible for the current situation.

 

Vaccine Shortage

The decisions to mix vaccines in Canada was done out of necessity. We had a shortage of vaccines. 
Why? Canada did not have the labs to produce vaccine.

All our hopes and plans were put into the ill-advised CanSino (Dalhousie project).

There is responsibility and I am sure we will hear much more once the pandemic passes and normal federal governing resumes.

[broberts]

1 hour ago, tert333 said:

 

I agree that the government made the decisions based on the assumption that they were doing it to save lives.  Many countries are taking a more scientific approach to the mixing of vaccines, including the UK.  Looking back at it, people made the decision to go with a mix, because our government (through NACI) recommended it.   We all relied on their judgement, as they were the experts.  At the time, there was limited test results on mixing and matching.  Whereas there were full clinical studies that showed the efficacy of the AZ vaccine taken as a complete package.

 

I believe that NACI, through this process kept flip flopping and sometimes contradicted Canada public health, to a point where someone made the decision that recommendations should flow through Canada public health, instead of directly from NACI.

 

We should look to NACI to do their due diligence before making recommendations.  They clearly jumped the gun as many reputable organizations such as the World Health and CDC, do not believe there has been enough testing to recommend mixing of doses. 

 

It is a mess as our Canadian health authorities made recommendations without having done a full analysis and understanding the impact of their decisions.  As a result, we became a group of test subjects proving the validity of mixing vaccines.  

 

Best intents does not translate into the best decision.

 

 

 

 

You are ignoring the context in which the decisions were taken. The supply of vaccines was severely limited initially and many consumers were unwilling to get a second AZ shot as a result of media coverage of the blood clot concerns.

 

There were no good decisions to be made. Had the diligence you suggest been done thousands more Canadians would likely be dead.

[tert333]

2 hours ago, broberts said:

 

You are ignoring the context in which the decisions were taken. The supply of vaccines was severely limited initially and many consumers were unwilling to get a second AZ shot as a result of media coverage of the blood clot concerns.

 

There were no good decisions to be made. Had the diligence you suggest been done thousands more Canadians would likely be dead.

There was a supply of AZ when I got the vaccine PFizer.  Was given a choice - my wife actually took the AZ second dose.  Supply was not an issue.

 

Thousands would not be dead if people took AZ as the second dose. Don't blow things out of proportion.

 

The good decision was to continue with AZ as the second dose, like millions of people around the world are still doing.   NACI knew at the time the approach they recommended was not supported by the World Health organization - and still is not approved by them.

[broberts]

7 minutes ago, tert333 said:

There was a supply of AZ when I got the vaccine PFizer.  Was given a choice - my wife actually took the AZ second dose.  Supply was not an issue.

 

Thousands would not be dead if people took AZ as the second dose. Don't blow things out of proportion.

 

The good decision was to continue with AZ as the second dose, like millions of people around the world are still doing.   NACI knew at the time the approach they recommended was not supported by the World Health organization - and still is not approved by them.

 

I didn't say AZ supply was the issue. I said consumer reluctance was the issue with AZ. Supply was the issue with Pfizer / Moderna. 

 

Why are you blaming the government for the choice you made?

[tert333]

52 minutes ago, broberts said:

 

I didn't say AZ supply was the issue. I said consumer reluctance was the issue with AZ. Supply was the issue with Pfizer / Moderna. 

 

Why are you blaming the government for the choice you made?

This thread is about mixing AZ, not supply concerns around  Pfizer/ Moderna.  Please keep to the topic. 

 

I made the decision based on the recommendations from the government. 

 

 

 

 

[broberts]

19 minutes ago, tert333 said:

This thread is about mixing AZ, not supply concerns around  Pfizer/ Moderna.  Please keep to the topic. 

 

I made the decision based on the recommendations from the government. 

 

 

 

 

 

I'd be happy to if I did not feel it necessary to respond to inaccurate statements.

 

As to the government guidance, had you truly believed the various governments involved had not done due diligence I have to wonder at your acceptance of the recommendation.

 

People made choices. People had the ability to research their options, nothing was hidden. Now apparently some do not want to accept the consequences of those decisions.

[Fouremco]

12 hours ago, broberts said:

I don't see a mess. What i do see are a number of people upset that decisions made to save lives have resulted in the need to hold off on cruising.

Clearly, the initial decision to delay second shots in order to get more people partially vaccinated, and the later decision to allow mixed doses, were made to reduce cases and to save lives. The problems now for travel and cruising can and will be fixed, but you could never go back and undo the deaths of Canadians who might have died needlessly had these decisions not been made.

[tert333]

2 minutes ago, Fouremco said:

Clearly, the initial decision to delay second shots in order to get more people partially vaccinated, and the later decision to allow mixed doses, were made to reduce cases and to save lives. The problems now for travel and cruising can and will be fixed, but you could never go back and undo the deaths of Canadians who might have died needlessly had these decisions not been made.

I agree and good point.

[Grimsbydad]

On 7/19/2021 at 5:23 PM, Magicat said:

https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/some-cruise-lines-not-accepting-passengers-with-mixed-covid-19-vaccinations-1.5514985

 

CTV News confirms.  Looks like only Royal is accepting mixed vaccines.

BUT, Royal requires them 28-42 days apart.  Most people in Canada, including my wife and I, received the vaccines more than 42 days apart.  We are booked on Royal in November.  Also different countries and states have different rules, you have to check the rules for the port you are leaving from

 

[Ciren219]

I can't keep up with all the changes the cruise lines keeping making and none for the better. Since we have mixed vaccines and don't expect things to change soon, we decided to cancel our Sept Alaska cruise tomorrow. We'll fight for a refund since they changed their policy after we paid in full. BTW, I have a letter from the CDC that considers us fully vaccinated, even having two different vaccines.

 

We have five more cruises booked and we don't want to end up with a pile of FCC that we can't use if the policies don't change. Anyway, we wanted to take our dollars somewhere else and make some plans for the same dates.

[K_e_short]

18 minutes ago, Ciren219 said:

I can't keep up with all the changes the cruise lines keeping making and none for the better. Since we have mixed vaccines and don't expect things to change soon, we decided to cancel our Sept Alaska cruise tomorrow. We'll fight for a refund since they changed their policy after we paid in full. BTW, I have a letter from the CDC that considers us fully vaccinated, even having two different vaccines.

 

We have five more cruises booked and we don't want to end up with a pile of FCC that we can't use if the policies don't change. Anyway, we wanted to take our dollars somewhere else and make some plans for the same dates.

 

I would say that asking for a refund is the best choice.

I think the stress of knowing you have money tied up in a specific cruiseline isn't good and really having money tied up in cruising right now isn't good either 😞

 

[soccersharon]

Of course here in Quebec, we were encouraged to take the first vaccine we could as well.  But I was monitoring the vaccine delivery schedules, and this paid off for me.  I waited an extra couple of weeks, and Pfizer became available.  I wasn’t comfortable personally with taking AZ, and now I’m really happy I waited.  Double dosed with Pfizer now.

Edited August 1, 2021 by soccersharon

[schiff1997]

Celebrity again has changed their decision on any mixed vaccines, no longer allowed on any cruise departing US ports

[LucasLounger1]

On 7/31/2021 at 10:11 PM, Ciren219 said:

I can't keep up with all the changes the cruise lines keeping making and none for the better. Since we have mixed vaccines and don't expect things to change soon, we decided to cancel our Sept Alaska cruise tomorrow. We'll fight for a refund since they changed their policy after we paid in full. BTW, I have a letter from the CDC that considers us fully vaccinated, even having two different vaccines.

 

We have five more cruises booked and we don't want to end up with a pile of FCC that we can't use if the policies don't change. Anyway, we wanted to take our dollars somewhere else and make some plans for the same dates.

Please report back on if you are successful getting a refund.  I'm thinking of trying for a refund over this, but I'm in a "non-refundable deposit".  The product they want to offer me is no longer appealing. 

[MaddyandMax]

56 minutes ago, LucasLounger1 said:

Please report back on if you are successful getting a refund.  I'm thinking of trying for a refund over this, but I'm in a "non-refundable deposit".  The product they want to offer me is no longer appealing. 

I heard back from Royal exec last night regarding my October cruise.  They told me I was out of luck for a refund currently because they only have protocols in place until the end of August.  So they get to hold my money until they decide what they want to do and in the meantime I can't book a vacation in a country that will accept me as fully vaccinated. I will not cruise as "unvaccinated".  It's insulting. I am more than angry.  They keep changing their policies 2-3 times a week and I'm supposed to sit here while they hold my money for 11 people booked on 3 different cruises....

[LucasLounger1]

9 minutes ago, MaddyandMax said:

I heard back from Royal exec last night regarding my October cruise.  They told me I was out of luck for a refund currently because they only have protocols in place until the end of August.  So they get to hold my money until they decide what they want to do and in the meantime I can't book a vacation in a country that will accept me as fully vaccinated. I will not cruise as "unvaccinated".  It's insulting. I am more than angry.  They keep changing their policies 2-3 times a week and I'm supposed to sit here while they hold my money for 11 people booked on 3 different cruises....

So it sounds like they won't even broach the subject of a refund until the protocols are announced for the actual cruise, which I'm sure will always be after final payments are due.  I don't blame you for being irate.  

[MaddyandMax]

Just now, LucasLounger1 said:

So it sounds like they won't even broach the subject of a refund until the protocols are announced for the actual cruise, which I'm sure will always be after final payments are due.  I don't blame you for being irate.  

That's exactly it.  Final payment was last month.  We made it hoping for the best but the back and forth constant changes has made it so my entire family doesn't even want to go on the cruise.  There is so much tension that all the pre-planning we did and excitement is now just anger.  Not only have we spent money on the fares but I also have over $2,500USD spent on tours and drink packages for my family of 4.

 

I understand that this isn't just Royal's fault.  There is blame to go all around.  I'm also mad at myself for listening to the science table and getting the first available second dose I could get and not waiting 4 weeks so I could get two of the same.  But we did what we needed to to protect others.  I feel like I'm being penalized for doing the right thing.  Whether my feelings are valid in others eyes isn't something I can control...  But it's horribly demoralizing.  Never did I dream that I would be penalized for actually being vaccinated and doing the right thing.  I'm sorry if others disagree with those feelings but that's what I'm currently working through right now.  My feelings on this are not because I don't think mixed doses is wrong.  I know I am protected, I know the science is there to support it (before anyone else jumps down my neck).

 

My only hope is that when the border opens to Canadians going to the US Biden can do something with the CDC and get them to accept mixed doses. But I don't know how much control, if any, Biden has over the CDC.  I expect not much.  Hopefully more science on mixed doses comes to light in the coming weeks.

[StanleyandGus]

2 hours ago, MaddyandMax said:

That's exactly it.  Final payment was last month.  We made it hoping for the best but the back and forth constant changes has made it so my entire family doesn't even want to go on the cruise.  There is so much tension that all the pre-planning we did and excitement is now just anger.  Not only have we spent money on the fares but I also have over $2,500USD spent on tours and drink packages for my family of 4.

 

I understand that this isn't just Royal's fault.  There is blame to go all around.  I'm also mad at myself for listening to the science table and getting the first available second dose I could get and not waiting 4 weeks so I could get two of the same.  But we did what we needed to to protect others.  I feel like I'm being penalized for doing the right thing.  Whether my feelings are valid in others eyes isn't something I can control...  But it's horribly demoralizing.  Never did I dream that I would be penalized for actually being vaccinated and doing the right thing.  I'm sorry if others disagree with those feelings but that's what I'm currently working through right now.  My feelings on this are not because I don't think mixed doses is wrong.  I know I am protected, I know the science is there to support it (before anyone else jumps down my neck).

 

My only hope is that when the border opens to Canadians going to the US Biden can do something with the CDC and get them to accept mixed doses. But I don't know how much control, if any, Biden has over the CDC.  I expect not much.  Hopefully more science on mixed doses comes to light in the coming weeks.

You have expressed exactly what I am feeling. 
 

I am also mixed doses. In Saskatchewan, AZ was all we had for quite a while. Our cruise isn’t until the end of January from Galveston, so things could change again.

I am quite certain that I am immunized. I don’t want a third shot unless it’s actually necessary, for reasons other than travel.

 

I did what was asked of me, and I’m glad that I did, but I really hope that someone is doing a peer reviewed study to demonstrate that the Canadian approach wasn’t terrible.

[jojal]

I feel for all Canadians  who are being prevented from travel/planning to travel because of mixed or unrecognized vaccines, spacing between doses, etc.  We all were vaccinated on the advice of medical experts.  We trusted them when they told us to get a specific vaccine or vaccines and when to get them.  We did the right thing to protect ourselves, our families, friends, colleagues, and the greater community.  Unfortunately, other areas of the world have different recommendations and expectations.  We had a feeling this would be the case and so cancelled upcoming cruises and rescheduled them for later dates.  But we are like all of you - missing travel so much and wanting to go asap!  In Saskatoon, we both got two doses of Pfizer, but certainly not within the 42 day window.  We have relatives who would like to head to the States this winter, but they have mixed vaccines.  It might be a moot point now, anyway, as the States are surging with Delta right now, sadly.  I don't see us traveling anywhere soon.