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Comment by jmnicolas | Hacker News Reader

> At preventing severe disease.

Why the hate for the unvaccinated if all you risk as a vaccinated person is a mild disease? There was no such paranoia for the flu which was still deadly.

I'm sorry but I fail to see the logic of what is happening in the world right now. As I said in another comment, I became a pariah in my country, France, for no good stated reason.

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Not everyone only risks mild disease, the vaccine isn't 100% effective on anyone and some have less ability to defend against the virus.

Elderly, and immunocompromised are the ones who willfully unvaccinated people put at risk. I don't want my parents to die so you can argue on the internet. There's also a timeline on this, the longer people wait to get vaccinated, the less time we have a strongly effective vaccine as it appears to reduce in effectiveness after six months.

You're helping to cause this vicious cycle.

The confusion you are spreading is the same as ignoring the difference between HIV and AIDs. If a vaccine was developed that prevented an HIV infection from causing AIDs, you would be the guy telling people it's safe to have unprotected sex even if you have HIV, as long as you're vaccinated. The mRNA vaccine does not prevent the infection from taking place, it prevents the infection from developing into the disease.

mRNA vaccines do not prevent the spread of SARS-COV-2, they are highly effective at preventing a SARS-COV-2 infection from causing COVID-19.

Which is why it's also important to wear a mask.

N95 since it spreads via aerosol

it's pointless to mess around with N95 if you haven't been fit tested. That means close shaves every day. A good analogy would be playing 4K video on a machine that can only render 720p resolution. You'll get a lot more buffering (discomfort) with no improvement in quality (proven benefit).

Improper fitting N95s are still vastlt more effective than proper and improper worn cloth masks, that’s due to the electret fiber charge :)

I love this thread.

At current stage, covid vaccines are mainly to reduce severity of infections with significant reduction in mortality. It doesn't really reduce spread of infections. Research has shown vaccinated individuals at least the same amount of load as unvacccinated. The general sayings of herd immunity with vaccinations can protect those unable to get vaccines don't apply for this situation. In fact, it will pretty much condemn those who don't get vaccinated when vast majority have been vaccinated and actively spread the infections.

Even the CDC admits you can still transmit the virus if you're vaccinated and that the viral load is equal to an unvaccinated person, so my vaccination wouldn't protect your parents anyway.

As you say, I "argue on the internet" because my freedom is stolen with the help of people so in fear that they can't think rationally anymore. I will NEVER let anyone dictate what to inject in my body and I would defend your right and anyone's to choose for themselves.

In 10 years your country and mine won't be recognizable because we will have let the politicians transform democracies in dictatorships since the majority was blindsided by an overblown fear.

Make no mistakes, I am not your enemy, the politicians that are pitting us against each other are.

A vaccinated person has equal viral load to an unvaccinated person? That's not substantiated by any of the available evidence AFAIK.

Early on the question was "can a vaccinated person transmit the virus?" and the answer to that question is yes; but, even with a low viral load, that can still be the case. So the vaccinated person can end up transmitting, but not as much, as an unvaccinated person. If the person asking the question wants just a yes or no answer, then the answer has to be yes. But that's not the full picture.

> As the Associated Press notes, Walensky cited data from the last few days, still unpublished, taken from 100 samples from vaccinated and unvaccinated individuals with COVID infections. They found that the amount of virus in the noses and throats of vaccinated infected people was nearly "indistinguishable" from what was found in unvaccinated people, confirming what some experts have suspected.

https://sfist.com/2021/07/27/cdc-confirms-that-viral-loads-i...

Yes, but the information we have now is that viral load declines much more quickly in vaccinated people than non-vaccinated people. These kinds of discussions where we just fling links we've barely read at each other never go anywhere, and it'd better if this unproductive thread wound itself up now.

85% of patients currently hospitalized for COVID-19 in Oregon have not received any dose of the available vaccines [1]. Oregon hospitals are almost at capacity for ICU beds and are expected to exceed capacity soon. The consequences are drastic for anyone requiring hospitalization; essentially you have to wait for an available bed (e.g. wait for its occupant to die or be discharged) or be flown to a hospital with capacity.

TL;DR: The unvaccinated are using 6 times the available medical care capacity of the vaccinated and are impacting the health outcomes for anyone who needs access to those medical resources, not just those who are suffering from a COVID-19 infection.

[1]: https://www.ohsu.edu/sites/default/files/2021-08/Oregon-Tren...

Why are we wasting limited medical resources on people who refuse to take the full COVID treatment regimen? (Which starts with vaccination.)

If we had limited ability to treat cancer patients, and someone refused treatment of their Phase 1 cancer, we wouldn't give them a bed over someone else, when they come back to the hospital in Phase 3.

There are trauma victims waiting in ERs, who can't get treatment because of this self-inflicted disaster. There are people waiting on life-saving surgeries, who can't come in for them, because all the doctors are busy, and all the beds are full.

Not getting vaccinated is a choice, but choices should have consequences.

Probably for the same reason why you don't reject obese people. 1.5 yrs of pandemic is a lot of time to lose weight and help with overloading hospitals. They should start using scales in front of pubs too or measure body fat :)

If obesity were preventable by two free shots, and the ICUs were flooded by an obesity epidemic, I'd consider it acceptable to take that into consideration during triage, too.

Obesity is the biggest co factor for people over flooding the ICUs, hence my comment. It's preventable by eating less.

Eating less isn't that simple, there's a bloody powerful biological imperative to eat, and modern diets, plus industrialized societies hijack a lot of the negative feedback loops that are supposed to prevent us from overeating... Also, crappy, addictive junk food - or empty carbs - tend to be the most affordable option at the grocery.

Vaccination is two free ten-minute appointments at any doctor's office, UCU, or grocery.

Comparing the two the way you do severely undersells why obesity is such a difficult problem to solve. If it could be solved by two free shots, it wouldn't be a difficult problem to solve.

For some people eating less is easier than getting vaccines. I know people who have panic attacks over the thought (they had to be put under to get vaccinated).

Also, lots of people come from communities that were experimented on by big pharma which explains rate differences amongst races.

> I know people who have panic attacks over the thought (they had to be put under to get vaccinated).

This can't be the reason for why >40% of the eligible population isn't vaccinated.

> Also, lots of people come from communities that were experimented on by big pharma which explains rate differences amongst races.

Even if this does explain lower vaccination rates among Hispanics and African Americans (Who, by the way, have much worse outcomes if they catch COVID), it doesn't explain why white people are also not getting vaccinated. It also doesn't explain why most minorities who have not gotten vaccinated give a reason of "I want to wait and see" [1], and why most white people who have not gotten vaccinated give a reason of "I've already made up my mind, definitely not getting vaccinated."

They don't trust doctors recommendations for vaccination, but apparently trust doctors recommendations for every other aspect of getting treated for COVID...

[1] https://www.kff.org/coronavirus-covid-19/issue-brief/latest-...

The point is that what other people not willing to do, or being afraid to do, can be difficult for them, even if irrational. I personally can't think of easier thing than losing weight when you know you will die younger and know the present life has worse quality of life as well. Of course the obesity problem has their own anti vaxxer movement where people claim obesity and health problems are not related, that it's beautiful etc.

What about drug addicts, alcoholics, extreme sports people we let them die too?

This is called solidarity, we pay taxes for that too.

Anyway I would still take my chance.

If drastically reducing the incidence of drug/alcohol addiction and sports injuries was as easy as administering 2 shots, we wouldn't be having this discussion.

It is ultimately your choice. Just understand that others making the same choice are currently filling up hospital beds. The numbers don't lie.

Can we expect that people who aren't vaccinated show some solidarity... And vaccinate themselves?

Solidarity with defectors only works when there are enough resources for everyone. When there aren't, we triage. First come first serve, at the expense of people who have not defected is a stupid way to allocate those resources, when there's such a simple preventative measure available.

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