Last I heard, the current vaccines do not prevent infection nor do they prevent shedding the virus and exposing others. They just prevent illness in those inoculated (in most cases), and prevent hospitalization. These are still great reasons to vaccinate, but I havent seen anything showing vaccines are actually slowing the spread of the virus.
No.
What you heard is that they couldn't tell yet whether or not they would prevent infection, because they did not have the data to answer that question.
How I understood it is that (until recently) there was no proof that the vaccines prevent infection, because the tests done so far weren't designed to check this, therefore they weren't sure they would; but considering experience with previous vaccines and medical expertise, they were pretty sure that there would probably be at least a decrease in spreading if only because you wouldn't be coughing around; and most likely a significant decrease.
Recent data shows that vaccines will in fact decrease infection considerably.
I don't understand how this misinformation is so commonly accepted as fact. It seems that everyone who hears this can't wait to spread it as a means to look smart and better informed than other people, because it's like a "hot take".
It's important that this misinformation gets rooted out as soon as possible because it's a common argument that people use to justify not taking a vaccine - e.g. "I won't take the vaccine because I'm young and I can take the disease, and it won't stop me infecting other people anyway". Spreading this misinformation is therefore quite literally dangerous and causing damage and costing lives, and like I mentioned even pro-vaccine people like to take it as fact and spread it around. It seems like a very viral fake fact.
You're arguing with people that already have a 99.9999% survival rate. Vaccine ain't gonna do shit for them...and as you've stated. Their lack of illness drastically reduces their infectiousness.
Also, there is often a confusion where scientist say "we do not know (yet)" and it gets interpreted as "it does not". This happened wrt to vaccines reducing transmission and it also is happeing wrt the protection duration. Scientists say "we don't know whether immunity lasts longer than six months" and you will see people talking how immunity only lasts six months.
Scientists seem completely comfortable saying things like "racism is the real virus" though, when only a short time before they claimed anyone going out in public for non-essential activities was playing a game of human sacrifice.
The idea that they're hesitant to make unfounded conclusions is wrong because there's been all sorts of bizarre statements throughout the entire establishment over the course of the pandemic.
Doom scenarios are the norm, and usually offered with no to little evidence, meanwhile any good or slightly optimistic news is always downplayed.
“ Among those who were fully vaccinated, there were .04 infections per 1,000 person-days, meaning that among 1,000 persons there would be .04 infections in a day.
There were 0.19 infections per 1,000 person-days among those who had had one dose of the vaccine. In contrast, there were 1.38 infections per 1,000 person-days in unvaccinated people.”
Measuring infectiousness is more difficult, since you can't isolate healthy unvaccinated people and see if they get infected. Since we know the viral load is an important factor for COVID infectiousness, you can reasonably use the viral load as a proxy for measuring infectiousness, and the viral load DOES drop significantly for people who have had the vaccine.
*Edit Now we know: it does reduce transmission.
Data analysis in a study by the Israeli Health Ministry and Pfizer Inc found the Pfizer vaccine developed with Germany’s BioNTech reduces infection, including in asymptomatic cases, by 89.4% and in syptomatic cases by 93.7%. Findings of the pre-published study, not yet peer-reviewed, but based on a national database that is one of the world’s most advanced, were first reported by the Israeli news site Ynet late on Thursday and were obtained by Reuters on Friday. Pfizer declined to comment and the Israeli Health Ministry did not respond to a request for comment. A separate study by Israel’s Sheba Medical Center published on Friday in The Lancet medical journal found that among 7,214 hospital staff who received their first dose in January, there was an 85% reduction in symptomatic COVID-19 within 15 to 28 days with an overall reduction of infections, including asymptomatic cases detected by testing, of 75%. More research is needed to draw a definitive conclusion, but the studies are among the first to suggest a vaccine may stop the spread of the novel coronavirus and not just prevent people getting ill. Michal Linial, a professor of molecular biology and bioinformatics at Jerusalem’s Hebrew University, said the findings were a big step towards answering one of the most important questions in combating the pandemic. “Whether it is 75 or 90 percent reduction doesn’t matter - it is a big drop in transmission,” Linial said. “It means that not only is the individual vaccinated protected, the inoculation also provides protection to his or her surroundings.” The researchers said further study was needed on asymptomatic transmission among people fully vaccinated because they are less likely to be tested for COVID-19. Vaccine developers have also said more research was needed on transmissibility. In December, Germany’s BioNTech said it would take three to six months more study. [0]
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College students in the United States, vaccinated with Moderna Inc’s COVID-19 vaccine, will be part of a new study to test its effectiveness in curbing the spread of the virus, the COVID-19 Prevention Network said on Friday. The trial, backed by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), is designed to determine if the vaccine, mRNA-1273, can prevent coronavirus infection, limit virus in the nose, and reduce transmission from vaccinated individuals to their close contacts. The Prevent COVID U study, funded by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), will monitor about 12,000 young adults across 20 universities over a five-month period. [1]
[0] https://www.reuters.com/article/health-coronavirus-israel-va...
[1] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-modern...