re: Offshoot of Another Thread - Why does Covid Vaccine have to be so Cold?

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It has to be stored and shipped at -73C.

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I’m pretty sure Celsius stops at 0. I’ve heard they’ve been converting to Fahrenheit at like -90 something. Thank God we didn’t let them totally get rid of our system or this vaccine may not exist.

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I’m pretty sure Celsius stops at 0

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Nope - Celsius scale goes negative below the freezing point of water (which is 0° C). The Kelvin scale does not go below 0 (which is about -273°C)

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Oh, hell I don’t know.

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that much is obvious

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Vaccines contain live strains of whatever virus

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I do not believe this to be true.

All drugs must pass accelerated stability testing, which is done at a higher temperature than the storage temperature listed on the labeling. Many drugs also require higher humidity exposure during accelerated testing to challenge the closure system. The vaccine likely failed accelerated stability testing for storage at 32, or -10, or whatever and forced storage at a very low temperature level to pass stability testing requirements.

FDA likely requires at least 6 month stability labeling for the vaccine, and the only way to meet that requirement was at the ultra low temperature.

My belief is any vial that is thawed out must be used within a few days, or discarded.

The vaccines that don't require the low temperature storage temperature passed accelerated stability for the storage temperature labeling.

The difference in the two vaccines is likely some kind of formulation difference.

One of the reasons for lengthy delays to achieve FDA approval of a drug product is the requirement for stability testing. The agency has been known to (arbitrarily? - without an industry acceptable reason) demand full time stability test data on a drug and deny use of accelerated data. If you label with a one year expiry date, that means a 1.5 year stability test must be submitted (1.5 times labeling date).

I did this stuff for a living for almost 50 years is the pharmaceutical industry.

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Nope - Celsius scale goes negative below the freezing point of water (which is 0° C). The Kelvin scale does not go below 0 (which is about -273°C)

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Either way, thank God we didn’t let them talk us out of Fahrenheit in the 80s.