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Comment by boringg | Hacker News Reader

I picked up on the strangely vague "medical professionals" piece as well. One thing I learned from the pandemic is that not all health/medical professionals are created equal, and that there is a large portion of very specifically trained and fairly uneducated people in the medical community.

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My mom was a RN most of her career then got her masters and went into education. My dad is a nurse practitioner. I didn't specify it explicitly because I didn't think it was relevant -- I was not trying to use vagueness to imply they were medical doctors and use them as a source of authority. All was trying to do was build them up at least a little, they do know more about the body than most people even if they aren't anywhere near experts on what the vaccine does.

It is, unfortunately, a relevant and important point. I've heard of plenty of nurses who got wrapped up in conspiracy theories and completely ignored the experts, but very VERY few doctors or pharmacists. Knowing how to take care of someone who is sick is a far cry from being an expert on vaccines or viruses.

Just to add some other insight here...

My Wife, a ICU RN+CCRN spent most of her 2020 on the COVID floor. It was pretty brutal for her.

She has coworkers, of equal status, who experienced pandemic alongside her first hand - who were extremely hesitant to get the vaccine. This includes several months after the initial rollout to staff.

Do you have any idea _why_ they were hesitant?

Something I heard from Shepard Smith cleared this up for me the other day- when talking about a potential shortage of “medical professionals” in NY due to the vaccine mandate, he also provided a statistic that 98+% of doctors and 95+% of nurses are vaccinated. This is a breakdown that I appreciated, as I value the health-related decisions of doctors more than the entire category of “medical professionals”.

Good point. When there's already kind of a shortage, losing 2-5% is a massive blow.

> One thing I learned from the pandemic is that not all health/medical professionals are created equal, and that there is a large portion of very specifically trained and fairly uneducated people in the medical community.

I have medical professionals in my family. Your statement sums it up. In my experience, physical/occupational therapists are the most likely to believe in crazy stuff (from a medical standpoint). RNs come next. I'm sure there are people in between on that spectrum, but I don't interact with them much.

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