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Comment by dragontamer | Hacker News Reader

> Aren't antibody titers just one measure of immunity?

Yes. But Omicron just came out 3 weeks ago.

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We start with the quickest measures of immunity. As better data comes in, we change our opinion. The gold-standard is a large-scale, multi-month A/B test. There simply hasn't been enough time for that to be created.

If these smaller tests prove adequate, we probably will skip the large-scale test... much like Alpha and Delta, it seems like these variants don't last very long in practice. We just barely finished studying Delta's effects across a variety of treatments, and all of that data is about to become obsolete with a new variant.

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> We start with the quickest measures of immunity. As better data comes in, we change our opinion.

This is exactly the problem with pandemic messaging. Too many claims based on garbage data that end up being wrong later. The result is a population that doesn't trust its government's guidance.

Vaccines were supposed to end the pandemic. Then it was they would keep you from getting sick. Then it was you'd still get sick, but you wouldn't spread it. Now it's you'll still get sick and you'll still spread it, but you won't die.

> This is exactly the problem with pandemic messaging

There's two parts to the pandemic. Gathering information, and spreading information. You need to spread the currently known things, so that scientists know what else to look for.

Welcome to the world of science and learning. You know one thing, and then it changes as new tests come in. Its impossible to get to the truth from the beginning in one step.

On the contrary -- welcome to the world trust building.

If you only know one thing, you keep your mouth shut until you know more. And if the thing you know isn't actually known, like how effective the vaccine really is, that goes double.

Notice that doesn't require you to "know the truth from the beginning in one step." It requires the people in charge to show some restraint.

You only get so many opportunities to be wrong before that trust is eroded.

“ If you only know one thing, you keep your mouth shut until you know more. ”

So hiding and covering up information is the way you think scientists should build trust, rather than being open and also clear about the limitations?

The lack of trust has nothing to do with scientists publishing data and everything to do with hucksters who misinterpret or lie about it to spread anti-vaccine panic or “government control” conspiracy theories.

The lack of trust in these situations seems to come more from how many people perceive the world of science. Many people seem to think once science has an answer it can't be wrong, and it's difficult to change, when it's more or less the complete opposite. That's what we've been taught in school. No one has been taught about how many studies turned out wrong or are easily misleading, or how to study papers and make research.

I blame education for that, for it doesn't properly teach you how to understand science. Science is taught like a Bible, when it should be taught as something people created and it's error prone.

Damned if you do, and damned if you don’t.

> And if the thing you know isn't actually known

Who do you want to be the arbiter that gatekeeps this information and decides the science is strong enough that you “actually know”?

And that's why academics shouldn't be the face of policy making. But I guess they liked the spotight too much to step out of it.

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