Reaching 'Herd Immunity' Is Unlikely in the US, Experts Now Believe (nytimes.com) 734
Widely circulating coronavirus variants and persistent hesitancy about vaccines will keep the goal out of reach. The virus is here to stay, but vaccinating the most vulnerable may be enough to restore normalcy. From a report: Early in the pandemic, when vaccines for the coronavirus were still just a glimmer on the horizon, the term "herd immunity" came to signify the endgame: the point when enough Americans would be protected from the virus so we could be rid of the pathogen and reclaim our lives. Now, more than half of adults in the United States have been inoculated with at least one dose of a vaccine. But daily vaccination rates are slipping, and there is widespread consensus among scientists and public health experts that the herd immunity threshold is not attainable -- at least not in the foreseeable future, and perhaps not ever. Instead, they are coming to the conclusion that rather than making a long-promised exit, the virus will most likely become a manageable threat that will continue to circulate in the United States for years to come, still causing hospitalizations and deaths but in much smaller numbers.
How much smaller is uncertain and depends in part on how much of the nation, and the world, becomes vaccinated and how the coronavirus evolves. It is already clear, however, that the virus is changing too quickly, new variants are spreading too easily and vaccination is proceeding too slowly for herd immunity to be within reach anytime soon. Continued immunizations, especially for people at highest risk because of age, exposure or health status, will be crucial to limiting the severity of outbreaks, if not their frequency, experts believe. "The virus is unlikely to go away," said Rustom Antia, an evolutionary biologist at Emory University in Atlanta. "But we want to do all we can to check that it's likely to become a mild infection." The shift in outlook presents a new challenge for public health authorities. The drive for herd immunity -- by the summer, some experts once thought possible -- captured the imagination of large segments of the public. To say the goal will not be attained adds another "why bother" to the list of reasons that vaccine skeptics use to avoid being inoculated. Yet vaccinations remain the key to transforming the virus into a controllable threat, experts said. Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the Biden administration's top adviser on Covid-19, acknowledged the shift in experts' thinking. "People were getting confused and thinking you're never going to get the infections down until you reach this mystical level of herd immunity, whatever that number is," he said.
How much smaller is uncertain and depends in part on how much of the nation, and the world, becomes vaccinated and how the coronavirus evolves. It is already clear, however, that the virus is changing too quickly, new variants are spreading too easily and vaccination is proceeding too slowly for herd immunity to be within reach anytime soon. Continued immunizations, especially for people at highest risk because of age, exposure or health status, will be crucial to limiting the severity of outbreaks, if not their frequency, experts believe. "The virus is unlikely to go away," said Rustom Antia, an evolutionary biologist at Emory University in Atlanta. "But we want to do all we can to check that it's likely to become a mild infection." The shift in outlook presents a new challenge for public health authorities. The drive for herd immunity -- by the summer, some experts once thought possible -- captured the imagination of large segments of the public. To say the goal will not be attained adds another "why bother" to the list of reasons that vaccine skeptics use to avoid being inoculated. Yet vaccinations remain the key to transforming the virus into a controllable threat, experts said. Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the Biden administration's top adviser on Covid-19, acknowledged the shift in experts' thinking. "People were getting confused and thinking you're never going to get the infections down until you reach this mystical level of herd immunity, whatever that number is," he said.
And somehow this is acceptible. (Score:4, Insightful)
So many people are ignorant and controlled by harmful propaganda, to the point that we can't get them to take a couple of vaccine injections to stop people from dying or getting long term health issues, that the virus in question has zero hope of being stopped.
And rather than do something about those people, the answer is somehow, "We'll just worry about the people most likely to be harmed by the virus".
We're talking about population-wide health issues and reduced lifespan, forever, but because the immediate effect on most people is just rare enough that it can be ignored with a bit of effort, that's what we'll do instead.
This is insanity. This is stupidity.
Time to do something about it. (Score:4, Insightful)
It's been a long time coming but we really need a misinformation/disinformation law in the US like Canada has. The sooner we get it the better this nation will be.
Re:Time to do something about it. (Score:5, Insightful)
It's been a long time coming but we really need a misinformation/disinformation law in the US like Canada has. The sooner we get it the better this nation will be.
And who would decide what is misinformation/disinformation? The party currently in power? There is a ton of it flooding from all over the political spectrum.
Re:Time to do something about it. (Score:4, Insightful)
The good part of truth is that it doesn't require anyone to decide if it's true or not. There are things that can be proven, and there are things that cannot. Then there are things that can be proven to be lies. Again, it doesn't take anyone's "decision".
People one the right are counting on large groups of people giving up and believing that there is no such thing as truth. From vaccines to the Big Lie, they're hoping to kill the very concept of Truth, since they've already done their best to kill off Justice and the American Way.
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Re: Time to do something about it. (Score:3)
Re: Time to do something about it. (Score:4, Interesting)
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For 11 to 15 day hospital stints, patients under 20 continued to pay more than their counterparts. The average amount for this group was $324,285 compared to $152,388 for patients over 60. The cost of hospital stays over 15 days jumped significantly, although there were not enough patients under 20 who were hospitalized for this long for FAIR Health to report on. Patients aged 21 to 40 paid the most for these longer hospitalizations, on average paying $980,821.
Re:Time to do something about it. (Score:5, Insightful)
It's been a long time coming but we really need a misinformation/disinformation law in the US like Canada has. The sooner we get it the better this nation will be.
Facebook and co will throw Billions against that kind of law to keep their business model. BTW so will China. American politicians are easily bought
Re:Time to do something about it. (Score:4, Insightful)
American politicians are easily bought
You're not kidding... and Ted Cruz basically told us all his price recently! He told us that he accepted $2.6 million in campaign contributions to ignore $12 billion dollars is back taxes owed. So, if I want a $1,000 favor from the government, apparently I just need to buy off ole Cancun Cruz with a $0.22 cent campaign contribution...
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Re:Time to do something about it. (Score:4, Insightful)
No...during a pandemic, dangerous behavior is dangerous behavior, period.
If you are going to shout "listen to the scientists" and get upset when some people break from that, then you would be upset of ANY people break with it.
Re:Time to do something about it. (Score:4, Insightful)
No...during a pandemic, dangerous behavior is dangerous behavior, period.
Of course it's dangerous behavior. But is is more dangerous than being summarily executed for being black?
COVID is dangerous. But not nearly as dangerous as being a black person in some areas of the USA.
Re:Time to do something about it. (Score:4, Insightful)
Actually, it turns out you do because your ilk believe a lot of bullshit that turns out to be harmful. For example, misinformation/disinformation about the vaccinations. If it only harmed you, it wouldn't be a problem. However, you are harming other people as a result at which point it becomes a social problem.
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People who deceive others, prefer being lied to, or benefit from lies are always against stopping the flow of lies. Also, no, I love this country which is why I will help improve it rather than running away from the problems it has.
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Otherwise this isn't surprising. We have had decades of people making bad choices with regards to smoking, diet, etc. that have created serious health issues and we've not been able to do much about those. Until we start letting people face the consequences of their bad decisions they aren't going to c
Re:And somehow this is acceptible. (Score:4, Insightful)
Does it really matter if there's enough in local areas to achieve immunity?
Yes, it matters. Large populations of unvaccinated people put vaccinated folks at risk in the long run via two mechanisms. The first is that they are a breeding pool for the disease, providing it with more opportunities to mutate into vaccine resistant or more lethal or communicable strains. (If you haven't ever seen this video [youtu.be], it's an eye-opener.) The second is that they are a reservoir of the disease which will periodically spill over as vaccine efficacy declines after a couple of years, or as vaccination rates decline in vaccinated areas when people in those regions become less aware of the risk (as happened with measles in the US in recent years).
Re: And somehow this is acceptible. (Score:4, Insightful)
Once we get approval for kids, Ill be done with the mask bs. Im not protecting someone refusing to vaccinate. Its one thing when catching it is beyond your control. Its entirely another when you willfully put yourself in harms way.
1. So what about people with a compromised immune system, for example cancer patients?
2. Why would you willfully put yourself in a position where you easier can spread an asymptomatic virus-infection?
3. A vaccine isn't 100% effective.
If you find it too onerous to wear a mask, just stay indoors and never go out in the public..
Re:And somehow this is acceptible. (Score:5, Interesting)
We're talking about population-wide health issues and reduced lifespan, forever, but because the immediate effect on most people is just rare enough that it can be ignored with a bit of effort, that's what we'll do instead.
I've often heard most people have a poor understanding of risk. (one example [seattletimes.com]) However, this pandemic has put the issue front and center.
It's also given me a new found respect for professional gamblers. They make their living not only understanding risk, but understanding why other people don't.
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Seems like that's just Darwinism at work, no?
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I am pissed too on how stupid these people are, and how they are backed up by large institutions.
However, I can't think of a good way to deal with them, that won't have a huge consequences in the long run. As much as we would love to beat them with a bat, inject them with the vaccine, and come back in 20 days and repeat. That isn't ethical, nor moral. Also it will make me look bad, as some violent mob, and will only harden their distrust. As well push away many people who on the fence away from us.
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As I've said before, this virus is Nature's way of making its own Darwin Awards [wikipedia.org]
Get them vaccinated (Score:2)
What would you have done differently? (Score:4, Interesting)
So many people are ignorant and controlled by harmful propaganda, to the point that we can't get them to take a couple of vaccine injections to stop people from dying or getting long term health issues, that the virus in question has zero hope of being stopped.
And rather than do something about those people, the answer is somehow, "We'll just worry about the people most likely to be harmed by the virus".
We're talking about population-wide health issues and reduced lifespan, forever, but because the immediate effect on most people is just rare enough that it can be ignored with a bit of effort, that's what we'll do instead.
This is insanity. This is stupidity.
If this outcome is not to your liking, what could you have done differently to make a better outcome?
By "you" I'm referring to the political side that has morphed the pandemic into a political issue. What could you have done differently?
And given what you *did* do, what other outcome could you expect?
We, and by we I mean the other side of the political spectrum, have been lied to, harassed, censored, insulted, and threatened for an entire year. Everything about the pandemic and the George Floyd murder was turned into a political referendum for the election, double standards were used everywhere, and even science itself was compromised in the process(*).
We never trusted you much to begin with, but in the past at least we could discuss alternatives and eventually come to a compromise.
Nowadays? Blatant violations of civil rights, killing the economy, putting the entire country in a state of economic stress and panic, with no oversight or recourse to appeal.
Think back about a year or so. If you knew then what the outcome now would be, what could you have done differently that would have led to a different outcome?
What would you have done differently?
(*) Literally, in the sense of papers hastily written, accepted by leading medical journals, then withdrawn because the data supported the opposite conclusion. This actually happened.
Re:And somehow this is acceptible. (Score:5, Insightful)
Let's be clear here. Once we realized just how quickly mutation can and did occur with this virus,
Citation needed.
Of all the RNA viruses out there, coronavirus has one of the slowest mutation rates. Try again.
the only insanely stupid concept that remained, was assuming we were going to effectively vaccinate an entire planet to avoid further serious mutation.
The spike protein — the one part of the virus that any of the current vaccines actually target — has been highly conserved through all the mutations, so every currently available vaccine remains highly effective against all mutations that have occurred so far.
Sure, we can talk about herd immunity; in the absence of mutation and third-world logistics. How realistic is that stupid conversation...
It was a whole lot more realistic before you started injecting pure fiction into it. Basically, almost everything you've said so far is not just false, but provably so beyond a reasonable doubt.
Yes, you have a point that if we don't vaccinate the third world, it could mutate enough that we might eventually have to vaccinate everyone again in a few years. And depending on how long immunity lasts, if we're unable to eradicate it completely, we might have to re-vaccinate everyone again every few years anyway. We really don't know yet. But to jump from not knowing for certain what might happen to believing that herd immunity is impossible would be downright silly. You're about a decade too early in making that prediction. You might as well be reading tea leaves.
Re:And somehow this is acceptible. (Score:4, Insightful)
You don't support your argument at all. You make it sound like Obama was a hardcore climate change advocate versus a guy saying, "hey, we should perhaps make some policies to reduce our footprint as a society." While flying on private jets is hardly a good look its not nearly as hypocritical as you are trying to make it out to be. Even if he advocated as tough as France with flights less than 2 hours getting banned then he still wouldn't be a hypocrite since the island is more than 2 hours away. Next you'll complain he wore a tan suit. It's not a good look, if you want to bash him there is plenty of other ammo such as his drone strike program.
That also has nothing to do with that fact that yes, there are trillions of dollars at stake in a new technology race which could be great for our economy and long term survival. Not all actions will be beneficial as trial and error is a thing in science. The bottom line people like Obama are espousing is that we should be trying things out or life is only going to get harder and harder for our children, especially as the Trump administration only stepped on the gas harder rather than trying to mitigate any future disasters. That's four lost years that we can't get back and they that was a critical time.
Recovery Is Already Stalled (Score:2)
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The recovery hasn't stalled completely. Infection numbers are still declining, though not as quickly as they could be.
BUT, the most important numbers that ARE declining quickly are hospitalizations and ICU admissions. Those are reaching 10-12 month lows across America. And really, that's the goal.
And we laughed about the mideval plague (Score:5, Insightful)
We look back at a set of plagues hitting Europe during the Dark Ages, and we chucked on how backwards they were, by killing off cats that would eat the rodents who carried the plagues (some historians debunked this I know but lets keep it simple, this is Slashdot after all). How other people were afraid to wash themselves and how the Plague doctors think it was passed on by bad smells. We had some people hunted down for witchcraft with their odd ideas of sanitation.
And now in 2021 we know how the virus works, and had created a vaccine to treat it, but for a lot of people they are so stuck in their misconceptions and general mistrust of those "Experts" that they are avoiding taking the vaccine, because they rather believe some guy whose job is to entertain you enough to prevent you from changing the station, vs the guy who has been focusing on the problem for over a year now, and also has decades of experience in that field, but who may not be so entertaining.
By summer of this about 80% of the people who catch Covid during that time, would probably be all on them and their own stupidity, fear and laziness.
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You deboonked your own analogy in your first sentence.
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> ... and how the Plague doctors think it was passed on by bad smells
HAHAHA What idiots. They thought they could stop a virus by wearing masks!!11!!1! They had such a primitive knowledge of medicine.
Herd immunity is INEVITIBLE (Score:2, Insightful)
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In modern times, herd immunity has been achieved for only a few diseases.
What makes you believe it is inevitable?
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And herd immunity won't really mean anything if it only includes one strain of COVID-19 and not all the relevant mutations.
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What makes you believe it is inevitable?
When there's only a few thousand people left alive on the planet, it's basically guaranteed. If not, when it's down to 100.
Re:Herd immunity is INEVITIBLE (Score:4, Informative)
Difficulty: Because there is no herd immunity, people will continue to spread the virus and it will continue to mutate, possibly into strains that previous exposure/vaccination provide little or no protection against.
Herd immunity is not inevitable.
=Smidge=
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The only question is how many people will die to achieve it.
Paradoxically, many and yet probably not enough.
Re:Herd immunity is INEVITIBLE (Score:5, Insightful)
Herd immunity has never been achieved by any other mechanism than mass vaccination and even then it is extremely difficult. We only just now eradicated polio largely due to the CIA creating mistrust in the 3rd where it was still running wild.
Even the measles is starting to come back because so many stupid people are afraid of the vaccine based on no evidence of any issues. People tend not to remember that is has nasty side effects that are way worse than flu like symptoms and can leave you sterile at the end even if you're not debilitated.
So in short, no, herd immunity is absolutely not inevitable.
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No Vaccination, No Hospitilization (Score:4, Insightful)
At some point, we need to tell people that opt out of science that it's an all-or-nothing opt-out. If you opt out of vaccination without good medical reason, then hospitals will not admit you for COVID treatment.
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At some point, we need to tell people that opt out of science that it's an all-or-nothing opt-out. If you opt out of vaccination without good medical reason, then hospitals will not admit you for COVID treatment.
Oh stop with your vindictive power fantasy. You might as well not admit smokers or the homeless or anyone you don't think was 'holding up their end of the bargain...'
Re:No Vaccination, No Hospitilization (Score:4, Interesting)
We don't give livers to alcoholics (and if were running low on other scarce healthcare resources we would put them lower on those lists too.) Antimaskers are more likely to get reinfected with alternate variants. Putting them at the bottom of the priority list is just standard medical ethics.
Insurance premiums (Score:4, Insightful)
Insurance companies should increase their premiums accordingly. Statistically, people who forego the covid-19 vaccines will incur more medical expenses. It's much easier to make people pay than to turn people away from hospitals.
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Every doctor everywhere takes the Hippocractic Oath. It dates back thousands of years, and any doctor not following it is likely to have their license revoked and be banned from practicing medicine.
Key to that Oath is several points: They will treat the sick, they will respect patient privacy, will prevent disease whenever they can, they will treat all people who are both sound of mind and body and those who are infirm, that
So, this is what I said all along? (Score:3)
I mean, I'm definitely no medical expert. I'm just another guy like many of you, who is able to look at situations rationally and logically and use past history as a guide.
But "herd immunity" seemed to me like one of those ideals that would have been great, if it could happen, but was more of a red herring as far as an end goal to shoot for?
It seems like historically, all of these flu type viruses wind up undergoing small mutations over time as they infect people and battle their immune systems. Ultimately, you end up with a virus that might be more adept than before at infecting a person, but far less deadly than the original variant. (Biologically-speaking, it's not very useful for a virus or any parasite to kill off all of its hosts.)
So far, all three newer COVID variants share a key mutation (called N501Y) on the spike protein, which allows the virus to bind more tightly to human cells. This mutation makes the new variants more contagious than previous SARS-CoV-2 variants. This would follow what I believe is the expected pattern... The virus undergoes changes to become more adept at infecting a person or hanging on while under attack by someone's immune system. But mutations weaken the virus itself - just like genetic mutations in humans create health issues rather than the comic book stories of x-ray vision or spider sense or anything "new and better" than we had before.
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But mutations weaken the virus itself - just like genetic mutations in humans create health issues rather than the comic book stories of x-ray vision or spider sense or anything "new and better" than we had before.
Mutations that weaken the virus of have costs that outweigh benefits just get selected out. The same way genetic rejects get selected out in people.
With something this contagious, there is little benefit in not killing the host. A lot of the times it spreads before the people even know they are infected anyway.
There isn't a guarantee that the virus will be weaker, just because it mutated. It could be better adapted to spread, and still kill just as readily, with little downside.
So what? (Score:3, Informative)
(1) It's still worth getting a vaccine, since it protects YOU. Those who want to be protected, will be protected. The vaccine will protect non-consenting people from severe illness or death. This is a good tihng.
(2) We will still approach herd immunity via "natural" infection among the population who chooses not to get the vaccine. I've heard that 75% of adults (so 60% of population) want the vaccine. But out of the remaining 40%, 1/3 may already have been exposed. This brings us to 70-75% of all PEOPLE (not just adults) with antibodies, approaching the herd immunity threshold.
(3) Herd immunity is not an on/off switch. It's just the point where spread becomes linear (new cases/day stay constant) absent other measures like masks.
(4) The US is doing very well as far as % of people vaccinated by world, and especially large-country, standards.
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The US is doing very well as far as % of people vaccinated by world, and especially large-country, standards.
Woah you cant say that!!
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1) Because some people have reached an ethical and moral level where they can care about other people too.
2) Herd immunity isn't a real thing. Never was. It's just a made up theoretical idea with no clinical definition that was assigned completely arbitrary benchmarks. No disease in human records were ever defeated by herd immunity through "natural" infection.
3) Herd immunity is best described by an infection rate dropping below 1.
4) We can still do better, and then we have to export vaccines to other nat
Re:So what? (Score:5, Interesting)
Unfortunately I think you are wrong in your premises. Unless we can get well over 70% of the people vaccinated, the individual benefits will start to fade over time as mutations continue. If we stall around 60-70% we might be able to slow down or identify clusters, but even that appears to be a stretch. Eventually we get to a point where the vaccines need regular updates to maintain some efficacy, and we lose the battle as the number of variants becomes something like influenza.
If we are going to have a chance at normalcy come next winter, it will require near-universal vaccination in the US.
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Oh, Well (Score:2)
Herd immunity is when assholes who won't take the vaccine would be protected.
They won't be. Good for them. You want protection, get vaccinated, and later, get your boosters.
And with RNA vaccines, there are very few people who can't get the vaccine.
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And also fortunately, it seems like being immunocompromised isn't always a bad thing for actually getting infected. The worst symptoms involve lung damage or blood clotting from an overreactive immune response. Depending, of course, on which part of your immune system is compromised. It seems like the same people who would react better/worse with the vaccine so I'm not sure if it stays relevant.
An important note (Score:2)
"Herd Immunity" was never a thing (Score:2)
"Herd immunity" was never a real thing. It was always just a theoretical idea that was assigned arbitrary goal posts. It's not, and never was a real thing. Read the article cited, even Fauci admits that.
“People were getting confused and thinking you’re never going to get the infections down until you reach this mystical level of herd immunity, whatever that number is,” he said.
“That’s why we stopped using herd immunity in the classic sense,” he added. “I’m saying: Forget that for a second. You vaccinate enough people, the infections are going to go down.”
Just get vaccinated if you haven't already.
Map shows clear polling problem (Score:5, Interesting)
https://static01.nyt.com/newsg... [nyt.com]
The above is a map of vaccine hesitancy cited from the article with the lower and higher bounds 49% and 91% respectively. That does not look like an accurate map of an opinion poll. Opinions do not follow sharp state boundaries, a person from rural North Dakota has pretty similar positions as someone from rural Minnesota yet this map is indicating that what state you're in is a dominant impact compared to other correlations like urban / rural and geographic region?
That looks like a clear systematic polling error as different states were surveyed by different groups of pollsters who either adopted different sampling methods or simply asked different questions from each other.
https://static01.nyt.com/image... [nyt.com]
That's a 2012 election map by county. Looks completely different, state's border's are nearly invisible relative to a country's political beliefs.
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The strange boundaries are a modeling error based on data collected separately by different states using different methodologies. That map should never have been published.
Another factor (Score:2)
There's another factor not being mentioned, which is that some people that are fully vaccinated are still contracting COVID. The symptoms are less and the prognosis is much better, but they are still being infected and they can infect others. Thus herd immunity, by definition, cannot happen since the vaccine is not actually making everyone immune. That is in addition to all the other factors (not everyone being immunized, new strains, etc). However the vaccines cannot be portrayed in any negative light w
Caused by morons not getting their vaccine (Score:2)
Now, more than half of adults in the United States have been inoculated with at least one dose of a vaccine. But daily vaccination rates are slipping, and there is widespread consensus among scientists and public health experts that the herd immunity threshold is not attainable â" at least not in the foreseeable future
So basically: "we think there are too many people who will refuse the vaccine, so we are unlikely to get herd immunity".
I'm curious what the mix of reasons to not get vaccinated are. I guess that anti-vaxxers and right-wingers who've had the issue politicized to them are mostly a lost cause at this point. So we'd probably want to target young people who think they don't need it, and those who are worried about the vaccine not being rigorously proven safe.
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Wrong.... This is just the simple-minded conclusion drawn, thanks to the endless media focus on the vaccine as the savior and the pandemic as something that'll "wipe out humanity" if we don't act now.
There are plenty of issues here with the "herd immunity" idea, including the fact that these vaccines were rushed out the door, without the normal 2 year trial period one would undergo before immunizing the masses. (Everyone getting the vaccine today is really part of the ongoing trial to verify how it will wor
Re: Caused by morons not getting their vaccine (Score:2)
If it evolved into something with mild symptoms it probably would be deemed a cold, not a flu.
Re:Caused by morons not getting their vaccine (Score:5, Insightful)
>Are there long-term negative effects to this vaccine that we have no way of knowing yet?
A fair question a priori since we have hundred of years of followup data on the smallpox vaccine, a lifetime worth on polio, and maybe a year for COVID vaccines.
Since we're all in the dark, I'll answer the question with three other questions.
1. Are there any examples in history of negative vaccine effects that didn't turn up within the first two months after vaccination?
2. Is there any mechanism that would give us reason to suspect the COVID vaccines will be the first exception?
3. If we imagine a problem coming up years from now, how will it compare in severity to the proven long term negative effects of a COVID infection?
Re:Caused by morons not getting their vaccine (Score:5, Funny)
3a) Instead of making up problems in the future why not make up benefits? There's no reason to limit our imagination to negative consequences only. I'm excited that the vaccine will give us all superpowers in the future!
Re:Caused by morons not getting their vaccine (Score:4, Insightful)
I have no problems being judgemental of those who are hesitant. Why? Because they have an almost complete ignorance about the vaccine they may receive, vaccines in general, virology, epidemiology, or any other subject area that would inform their choice. Yet they use that near-complete lack of knowledge to justify an opinion in opposition to consensus of opinion of public health experts that have spent decades accumulating the knowledge pertinent to the recommendations they give.
Before the pandemic, can you remember knowing who the manufacturer of any vaccination you had? I received a influenza immunization every one of the last 15 years, and I still have no idea who the manufacturer of any of those injections was. Yet this year, I know the manufacturer (Astrazeneca), their competition (Moderna, Pfizer-Biontech, Janssen), and even have a preference (Moderna). I don't know enough to weigh what vaccine is the right one for me, so I trust the recommendations of my healthcare providers.
If you don't know enough to qualify your opinion, don't have an opinion. If it exists, trust the near-consensus of expert opinion.
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It may not have had the usual 2 year trial period, but it is extremely likely to be less dangerous then the risks from getting COVID.
How long will immunity *really* last once people get these shots? Unknown, but there are people who got it almost a year ago.
Will the virus mutate enough so the existing vaccinated population isn't protected against the new versions? Possibly, but the more people who get the vaccine the less virus will be circulating the less likely that will occur. People getting different ki
Re:Caused by morons not getting their vaccine (Score:5, Insightful)
Are there long-term negative effects to this vaccine that we have no way of knowing yet?
The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are SARS and MERS vaccines with a different mRNA payload. So we've got a very good idea what the long-term dangers can be, since the SARS and MERS vaccines have been around for quite a while.
The only way there could be an issue is if the spike protein itself creates a long-term issue. Which would be really, really strange since it mimics an existing mammalian protein.
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The government can’t tell me what to do they cry! Unless two men want to get married or a woman wants an abortion. Then suddenly they’re all about telling others what to do.
I don’t know what’s in that vaccine they say while smoking a Marlboro and shoveling a big mac down their pie hole.
The best is that Alaksan politician banned from flying over her refusal to wear a mask. She’s crying about due process when this is the free market refusing her service. Hope she enjoys her 20 ho
It doesn't stop at the borders (Score:2)
US vaccination rate is a drop in the pond for variant development.
Last Week Tonight (Score:3)
Did their entire segment on this issue last night, worth watching, it breaks down the demographics, reasons and common myths about the vaccines...
Covid Vaccines: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO) [youtube.com]
This entire thing was a mess from the start. (Score:5, Insightful)
If this entire pandemic hadn't been used by everyone and their cousin for political purposes, we'd have been better off. People look at the history of the pandemic and go: "Masks don't work. Six feet distancing. Oh, lockdown, but the big chains can stay open and we'll just run the small businesses out of business. Wipe down everything with alcohol and bleach. Oh, no wear N95 masks. Oh, we don't have enough, so KN95s are okay. Uh, okay, it doesn't spread much by surfaces. Um, cloth masks are okay. Stay home unless you're protesting some righteous cause like BLM. Just 100 days and we'll flatten the curve! Yeehaw! Oh, wait, didn't work. Keep everything locked down indefinitely. You can't get a hair cut but Nancy Pelosi can. Um, wear two masks. No, wear four! Get the vaccine! Oh, wait, even when fully vaccinated your life still has to be destroyed, you can't go back to work, you have to wear a mask and can't assemble or go to church. No, three feet is okay for children says the CDC. Teachers unions want their teachers to keep getting paid and the schools to stay closed because they don't believe three feet. Oops, the vaccine from J&J is causing blood clots in 0.00009% of the people who receive it so let's 'pause!'. Joe Biden wears a mask on a Zoom call, then goes and addresses the people saying basically 'If you're really good you might get to have Fourth of July!' and then goes to a thinned out, socially distanced, totally immunized Congress without a mask while the rest of Congress is scattered around with masks firmly affixed."
Hell, it's tax season. Look at how many people just paid their (expected) obscene property taxes which in some areas (like Texas) predominately go to fund public education. These people are sitting here going, "What the hell am I paying for? The schools have been closed for a year."
This wasn't necessarily incompetence, negligence, or malevolence. I know it. You know it. The problem is when you throw contradictory things like this at a population consisting of people who don't understand you don't take Tylenol PM (acetaminophen and diphenhydramine) together with generic allergy pills and "fever reducer" (duplication), or who can't set their microwave clock, you're going to get a lot of confusion and eventually a defensive reaction that all those "know it alls" and "elites" are out to get them. It doesn't help that the "authorities" keep contradicting themselves.
This is why you see clowns sitting alone in their cars wearing masks, or schools mandating that a teenager wear a mask during an 800 yard track event, or people hiking out in the woods with masks, or -- my favorite to date -- some guy sitting on a boat/canoe-thing out in the middle of the river...wearing a mask.
This is Slashdot so I'm sure someone can come out with a computer networking infrastructure example for this.
This problem will fix itself (Score:5, Insightful)
The vaccine provides about a 90% protection from the virus, and nearly perfect protection from getting a "hospitalization needed" case.
So.... come fall, what's going to happen is VERY predictable at this point. We will be nowhere near herd immunity. The virus will surge. The hospital wards will fill and the dead will pile up again. Except, this time nearly everyone who is badly sick or dead will be COVID VACCINE HOLDOUTS. And I, for one, will feel very little sympathy for them as me and my family go about our daily lives largely untouched. This is Amurica, the land of the free. Everyone is free to be a booger-eating moron, place their faith in Trump and Tucker Carlson, and reap the consequences of their actions. Good or bad. They own it.
Yes, there will be VERY small numbers of very young, very old, immunosuppressed people and the exceedingly rare healthy vaccinated person among the badly sick or dead. This is not right, or justified, or fair. It just is. Pre-covid, vulnerable people always needed to take extra precautions. This will be even more important post-covid.
So, next fall, we need to just let evolution take it's course. The stupid and/or gullible unvaccinated people will get more sick, miss more work, make less money, fall behind in life more, acquire life-long covid damage at a higher rate, and be more likely to die. After about a decade, the holdouts will slowly come to accept that this is real, and the vaccination rate will climb into the mid-high 90s, just about the same as all the rest of the vaccines. But it won't be quick.
Too Bad for Bars (Score:5, Interesting)
As long as it continues, I'm going to have bar-hesitancy, restaurant-hesitancy, and theatre-hesitancy.
If the bars, restaurants and theatres want to demand vaccination as the price of entry, I'll gladly go to those ones, extra. Not just for the safety, but for the better company.
I wish that most jobs had this requirement, too, and of course, I'll be leery of doing business with any that don't. If many agree with me, then anti-vaxxer tolerance will be a drag on the whole hospitality industry for a long time. It'll just have to contract.
If there are countries that have a stronger vax-requirement stance in general, man, that's where my tourist dollars will go.
Re:Experts (Score:5, Funny)
Experts are boring! They are also condescending, because they tell you things you don't want to hear, and that makes you feel bad. They want to hear from entertainers who keep their interest, and tells you what you want to hear, because you want to feel like you are the smart guy!
Re:Experts (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Experts (Score:5, Insightful)
Person A: Don't put you hand on that Stove Top, that red light means it is hot. ...
Person B: Don't tell me what to do, you are just spreading fear about stoves!
(touches the stove and burns hand)
Person A: You have burned your hand, let me take a look at it.
Person B: No, you can control me, Ill just put some butter on the burn. My Mom told me to do that, and it is alliterative so its always allowed.
Person A: But....
Person B: Shut up and stop spreading your fear about butter too.
A few weeks later Person B, gets a large infection because he got a second degree burn, which the blister popped, and became infected. He declined to go to the doctors office, and ended up going to the ER a week later. Having to cut off part of his finger, and given a bill of $20k.
Person B: Now thanks to you my life sucks!
Sure all of this could had been resolved if he just heeded the advice and not touched the stove, if the person saw that it was a Second Degree Burn, they could had ran it under cold clean water, then wrapped it in clean gauze. Then gone to his normal primary care doctor, who may give him a specialty cream, which keeps the area clean and dulls the pain for only about $200.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Experts (Score:5, Informative)
Sadly, it wasn't meant as a joke, it was a paraphrase of my 80 year old Ultra Conservative Father, who spends hours watching Fox News, and calling all Democrats Muslims.
There is no point in trying to change or debate with him, because even if you have solid evidence, he will just jump into conspiracy theory and say those are actually democrats pretending to be republicans just to make them look bad.
He isn't that bad when there is something that hasn't been brought up as a political statement. (currently allowing me to only talk about wood working with him) However who knows a resurgence in Millennials getting into wood working, or some existing forestry law will get attention by fox news, and that topic will become an other minefield too.
Cars, Shoes, Beans, Weather, Hardware Stores, What I do for my work... All landmines of topics where if I accidentally go in that area we go into full rant mode.
My favorite is when my father (who doesn't know how to connect to the internet) is lecturing me on all the dangers of Big Data. I am like, Dad, I know, I am an expert in Big Data, I am the one who makes all these connections to find out a bigger picture, I have written Master Thesis on this topic. Then his response, I don't care about your degrees and studies and work in it. This is what I am telling is true.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
That's not really a very good argument. For starters, Fauci advocates masks and distancing as well as vaccines.
The anti-vaxers will love your argument. All they need to is convince enough gullible pols and you can forget using science to stop the pandemic. Global warming is another area where your argument is bad.
If we don't believe in science, we might as well go back to the dark ages.
Re:Experts should be listened to but not decide (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Experts (Score:5, Informative)
If your body is already going to fight the harmless spikes in the vaccine, why are you so scared to take it?
These are the same antibodies naturally produced by the immune system of someone exposed to the virus. The very same.
Plenty of studies have already shown that immunity from vaccines is stronger and more beneficial than the immunity from naturally fighting covid.
For [mercurynews.com] example [theconversation.com] Or check yourself [google.com]
Re: (Score:3)
How long ago did you have COVID, and how long do you think your immunity lasts? It could be as long as 8 months and it could be as short as 3 months. Go get your vaccine. It doesn't cost anything and the people in your life will stop thinking that you're a selfish asshole.
https://science.sciencemag.org... [sciencemag.org]
Everybody wants to get past this fucking pandemic. How about you do your part?
Re:Experts (Score:5, Informative)
The mRNA vaccines prompt the body to produce the spike protein of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. This, then, prompts the immune system to produce antibodies to fight this pathogen and, thus, immunity to further infection. These are the same antibodies naturally produced by the immune system of someone exposed to the virus. The very same. Whether you're exposed to the virus and develop the antibodies yourself, or you develop antibodies aided by a vaccine, they are the same.
That's not necessarily true. The human immune system can develop antibodies that bind to any part of the virus's coat, and it doesn't always get it right.
For example, the immune system's inability to guess the right binding site is the only reason that influenza is still around. Although there are parts of its viral coat that are preserved perfectly across all the different mutations, your immune system incorrectly picks parts of the virus that mutate frequently, and as a result, your immunity is very temporary.
Similarly, it is entirely possible for your body to produce antibodies that bind to the wrong viral coat proteins for COVID-19, resulting in temporary immunity that could be totally useless next week. By contrast, the spike protein itself seems to be highly conserved across all mutations, which means that those antibodies and the memory T/B cells that know how to produce them are much more likely to provide lasting immunity.
So yes, it's important for people to be vaccinated even if they have gotten COVID-19 previously. It's likely not *as* important, at least in the short term, but it's still important.
Re: (Score:3)
You are mostly right, but...
Although there are parts of its viral coat that are preserved perfectly across all the different mutations,
If that were true we would already have a vaccine against it.
There have been several attempts, but thus far no luck in getting the immune system to recognize those parts well enough to neutralize the virus, in part because people have too strong an immunity to the parts that are not conserved, which appears to prevent building up an immunity to the parts that are.
i.m. cH5/1N1 IIV+AS03 [sciencemag.org] looks promising, though. It is kind of similar to the COVID vaccines in terms of trying to build up immunity to the highly conserved stalk, using only low levels of the protein at the
After infection (Score:5, Informative)
As a matter of fact, that question has been researched.
Recovered COVID patients who follow up with a vaccine dose wind up with way higher antibody levels than just what the infection leaves them. Having an infection is like getting only one dose of a vaccine.
Re:After infection (Score:5, Interesting)
Recovered COVID patients who follow up with a vaccine dose wind up with way higher antibody levels than just what the infection leaves them. Having an infection is like getting only one dose of a vaccine.
This is anecdotal but we are finding a lot more stories similar to this. I have a relative who is a migraine sufferer, usually 3-5 bad migraines a month. After getting and recovering from covid, this relative was getting 3-5 severe migraines per week. Every day without a migraine was spent worrying whether it would become one. About 3 days after the second vaccination shot (Pfizer in this case), which was about four months after recovering from covid and all the migraine problems got so serious, they pretty much stopped. This was in mid-March, and this relative has had two migraines since, and we're going into May - they are crazy happy about this for obvious reasons. If you have long haul symptoms, get your butt in a chair and get jabbed, you might not have to suffer anymore.
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Re:Experts (Score:5, Informative)
I still wear a mask to the store, but only those that have signs posted that they're required.... I'm not going to judge you. I don't know how healthy you are, whether you're immuno-comprimised or pre-disposed to infection.
By going against CDC mask guidance and not wearing a mask indoors, then you've already judged and decided that no one around you is immune-compromised or otherwise at risk from COVID. The mask does more to protect others than it does to protect yourself.
Note that even for those that are fully vaccinated, current guidance is to wear a mask indoors.
Yep, I'm an idiot for relying on my immune system and the very same antibodies that your immune system how has. Science!
There are lots of stories about people that also decided to rely on their immune system, and that strategy worked great until it didn't and they caught COVID, leading many to express their regrets on their deathbed.
https://www.businessinsider.co... [businessinsider.com]
Re: (Score:3)
Then they should get vaccinated. Right? And, that vaccine will protect them. Right? If not, then what the fuck is the point of the vaccine?
Go look up "immune-compromised" then come back and ask a more informed question. It's also commonly called "immunocompromised" if that helps.
Re: (Score:2)
Explain why they are OK with a polio vaccine and not with the covid vaccine? Most people I talk to just dont want to be the ginue pigs. After people have been taking it for a while they will let up and get it.
Re: (Score:3)
They are willing to accept Trump got bamboozled on vaccines. It's called cognitive dissidence. They want him back as president though he got outplayed by the so-called globalists.
Re:It's become a political wedge issue (Score:4, Insightful)
While I am liberal, your viewpoint is why the Republican Party is still able to get half the vote. I start to get offended by the nonsense of the headlines and stories in the LA Times, priorities in California politics, and the inability of the Democrats to govern effectively or gain significant mind-share. In my own state, I wonder how the politicians are so incredibly ineffective if not corrupt, despite having a (D) by their name.
Congress needs to pass a law overriding vaccine passport prohibition at the state level. This should be a much higher priority than the infrastructure plan (which is only 25-40% infrastructure). These mega bill, all-or-nothing approaches are Whig part of the problem.