Covid is here to stay. What is the long term plan? 'Boost' every 6 months with an ever changing cocktail that has not passed any clinical trials? In perpetuity? This is insanity.
I do not see any long term way out of covid pandemic other than natural immunity. Some studies have shown it is much stronger than vaccine protection. I hope they are right, or else the future is grim. Personally I really really hope that vax + mild infection works.
WE DO have a population for which natural immunity can be acquired at minimum cost: under 18s. For which the risk of covid death is ~1-2% of the already tiny risk of death from all other causes. Leave the kids alone.
What doesn't help: Messaging that so incredibly determined to pretend that natural immunity plays no role and that covid risk for a 10 year old is the same as covid risk for an 80 year old (in fact it is 1/1000).
We get annual boosters for many viruses. If you’re really hell bent on getting covid, your likelihood of severe illness is 10x less with at least one dose of the vaccine, and your immunity will be higher than infection alone. The messaging that natural immunity is the only way out, and that getting the virus is somehow ‘better’ than the vaccine is ludicrous.
Tired of personalization of the disease. I'm not 'hell bent' to do anything. Covid is endemic, there is no herd immunity. The only question is how to manage the severity of the disease, for all the infection events to occur in the long run. I'm vaccinated and keep an eye on https://www.novavax.com/covid-19-coronavirus-vaccine-candida.... Or do I need to tattoo 'Pfizer' on my forehead to be allowed to participate in society?
And to be clear, this vaccine denial is a uniquely American problem. In Denmark over 80% of the eligible population is voluntarily vaccinated. They are now able to do away with virtually all Covid restrictions.
Not sure what to do about it, I caught myself doing it and I like to believe I am on-guard for this kind of behavior. I substantively edit my messages to remove first draft inflammatory words. Perhaps the old email advice: put it in drafts and send it tomorrow morning.
I've been thinking lately that even on HN having a 'parent upvoted your reply' signal might be an interesting experiment for promoting civil discourse.
Also existence of Denmark with high vax rates does not imply that the problem is uniquely American. To wit, Russia is even farther ahead in that regard. So no, it’s not uniquely American.
I think a whole lot of this angst boils down to society running well, due to this work in the past. Then people forget, believe it all works differently than it really does.
Now we are faced with a global problem, shared risks, shared resources and a whole lot of relearning to do.
this is untrue
japan has far lower vaccination rates than the US
https://www.usnews.com/news/healthiest-communities/articles/...
Bad smells that make me distrust: Changing definitions of the word vaccine, so that the Covid 19 injections can be considered a vaccine. It becoming impermissible to question the vaccine. If you tell me there isn't room to doubt, then my response to you is bullshit. I've been a skeptic my entire life, and it has served me well. If I'm wrong this time and I die because of it, so be it.
If your idea of “trust the science” starts and ends with “who’s in the White House?” you have a different definition of “science” than I do.
My argument is that by including these injections under the term vaccine, they are getting a halo effect from past vaccines that isn't warranted. Questioning vaccines is the lowest of the low, almost unthinkable, but these "vaccines" aren't like the old ones.
I checked 2 dictionaries from before 2020. Neither said a vaccine had to be made from certain things.
[1] http://web.archive.org/web/20190118214500/https://www.merria...
In all cases they make your body respond to proteins, that's all. Given the respective effective rates from mRNA vs. traditional vaccine methods if anything it's the halo effect of the effectiveness of the mRNA that are boosting the success rates.