During a presentation by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), a vaccine efficacy chart was displayed which has people a little hot under the collar.
The Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee presentation on the Emergency Use Authorization Application by Johnson & Johnson for its COVID vaccine is probably one of the last places you'd look for an erect penis, but due to a coincidence of the efficacy of the vaccine against severe COVID-19 over time, a graph plotting that data (and the confidence interval) showed precisely that.
Approved for use in the US on March 1, the single-shot vaccine is 85 percent effective at preventing severe COVID-19, and 66 percent effective at preventing moderate to severe COVID-19. It's the third vaccine to be approved, being beaten to the punch by the Moderna and Pfizer/BioNtech jab, but it's the first to demonstrate that it also makes a pleasing penis shape.
People had questions, which have all been answered penisly.
Other than a penis, what is this chart actually showing?
In layman's terms, the base of the penis shows a low confidence level, due to the fact that not many had had the vaccine yet. As the efficacy grows — as more antibodies are produced — so too does the shaft, pointing all the way up, which is what you want from a penis vaccine. The confidence level increases and remains steady, creating the grayed-out shaft.
By the time we get to the head of the penis — 56 days — efficacy is up, but the confidence interval is down. This is because the percentage of patients who were retested for antibodies drops from 93 percent at 42 days to 55 percent at 56 days. This will mainly be because not enough people had their jabs over 56 days ago, as well as a few dropouts.
So now that that's out of the way, sit back, relax and enjoy some penis jokes.
For more information about COVID-19, check out the IFLScience COVID-19 hub where you can follow the current state of the pandemic, the progress of vaccine development, and further insights into the disease.
