Is catching Covid now better than more vaccine? • Hacker News Board

Re: Is catching Covid now better than more vaccine?

#61

Post by meheleventyone » Sat, Aug 21, 2021, 1:05 PM UTC

Rezwoodly wrote: post #28

meheleventyone wrote: post #11

Tangentially related but I’m on day 9 of COVID infection which is easily the longest I’ve been sick in years. I got two shots of Pfizer last one on the 13th of July. If the vaccine has kept this relatively mild then I’m very glad. It sucks. My main symptoms are a stuffed up face, cough, sore throat, aching body and an extremely fuzzy head that seems to come and go. I had a slightly raised temp at the start but otherw…

Uh, you did get vaccinated and still have these symptoms. You could also fairly end your TLDR with 'did get vaccinated, this sucks'. It seems we are still learning about the efficacy of the vaccines, and the nature of the virus. From this pov I understand why some are hesitant to be vaccinated in this phase of the pandemic

Yes my point is that it’d be worse without being vaccinated and that my wife who is also vaccinated and spent seven days in close proximity with me whilst symptomatic has not been infected.

Re: Is catching Covid now better than more vaccine?

#62

Post by rossdavidh » Sat, Aug 21, 2021, 1:05 PM UTC

IAmEveryone wrote: post #14

This is the sort of valid point that one will tend to avoid discussing because it is likely to be misused by the ideological critics of vaccination. As an alternative I haven’t heard much of, updating the vaccines would seem to be a good option, as well? The first round was developed fast enough to almost outrun variants, so it should work quite well second time around. It’s important to avoid the naturalistic fallac…

Yes, but the actual results from Israel and elsewhere suggest that, in this case, infection is better protection. It's not the naturalistic fallacy, it's what we're actually seeing.

Of course, vaccination is far, far better than nothing. But for a 5-year old, or a 50 year old who's already vaccinated, it's not clear that more vaccination is better than just having your immune system learn from the real thing.

It's all a moot point, of course, since it seems like we're all getting exposed, regardless of what we want. Even white-tailed deer in Canada are getting covid-19, so it's not likely that humans living in cities are going to avoid it.

Re: Is catching Covid now better than more vaccine?

#63

Post by peytn » Sat, Aug 21, 2021, 1:06 PM UTC

gambiting wrote: post #30

benf76 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a risk of creating variants by mass vaccination. If everyone has a uniform defense generated by a vaccine, this creates selection pressures for a variant that is able to maneuver around the vaccine induced immunity.

Absolute nonsense though, as proven by looking at literally any of the diseases we have been vaccinating people for decades. Polio vaccine hasn't caused super polio to emerge, just like vaccines haven't caused super variants of hepatitis B, tetanus or whooping cough - all things that children are vaccinated against. Even the flu vaccine doesn't cause new variants, and that has a spotty coverage at best. Like, what yo…

> it's literally not true and has never been true.

It’s widely regarded to be true for Marek’s disease.

Re: Is catching Covid now better than more vaccine?

#64

Post by gjsman-1000 » Sat, Aug 21, 2021, 1:06 PM UTC

gunapologist99 wrote: post #52

walterbell wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From Bloomberg today, https://archive.is/fy4Wf > In lieu of answers, what has emerged is a host of case studies providing somewhat different pictures of breakthrough infections. Variables including when the surveys were conducted, whether the delta variant was present, how much of the population was vaccinated and even what the weather was like at the time make it hard to compare results and suss out patterns. It’s d…

> “It is generally the case that we have to make public health decisions based on imperfect data,” Why can't the public draw their own conclusions and make their own health decisions, based on (imperfect) public data? Why does the data have to be kept secret? (Perhaps the data doesn't support the "public health decisions" and dictates of the state?) If there's a concern that we can't effectively interpret the data, w…

What is the greater evil here? The slight odds of infection when they are likely outdoors, or that they are running track, passing out, getting dehydrated, breathing high levels of CO2, and the unknown long-term health effects of that?

It doesn't take much common sense to realize that exposure to virus is bad, masking while running is potentially much worse for everyone and not just the odd infection, and that it should be a choice if there are two evils.

Re: Is catching Covid now better than more vaccine?

#65

Post by francoisdevlin » Sat, Aug 21, 2021, 1:06 PM UTC

cactus2093 wrote: post #29

ekianjo wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> we should be vaccinating people to discourage spread Vaccinations with current vaccines don't stop infections/spread at all - it's very obvious now with the Delta variant in countries that are already massively vaccinated like Israel and Island. In fact, vaccinated people can apparently carry just as high of a viral load as unvaccinated people (while vaccinated people will likely experience less symptoms). So the v…

Reported your comment for misinformation, this is untrue.

Okay, citations for both sides should sort this out...

Re: Is catching Covid now better than more vaccine?

#66

Post by Aerroon » Sat, Aug 21, 2021, 1:06 PM UTC

PartiallyTyped wrote: post #24

blueflow wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cross-reference it to https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/leaky-vac... I suspect we have the deadlier variants not despite, but because we are vaccinating and the vaccination is not effective in preventing spread.

That assumption is based on the belief that an infection prevents reinfection, i.e. an infection is just as good at protecting a (recovered) patient as a vaccine is at protecting an uninfected person. But we have seen that Delta reinfects previously infected patients, ergo, an infection is at a best a leaky vaccine (ie as good as current vaccines, though there are indications that it is not [1]), and at worse, a cata…

But people that have been vaccinated have also been infected. Why would you call it a leaky vaccine when the vaccine leaks too? Or am I mistaken here?

Re: Is catching Covid now better than more vaccine?

#67

Post by TrispusAttucks » Sat, Aug 21, 2021, 1:06 PM UTC

XorNot wrote: post #3

What an utterly redundant point. If you catch and do not die from the virus then yay for you I suppose, but you'll still spread it around while you have it, you still might die from the virus, and there is literally no downside to having a better immune response when you inevitably do catch COVID-19 as we're all going to eventually. Like everything else, the goal of every single public health measure at the moment is…

Sure. But. There is more to life then just maximizing safety in perpetuity. We must live and move on with the business of life.

Re: Is catching Covid now better than more vaccine?

#68

Post by rossdavidh » Sat, Aug 21, 2021, 1:07 PM UTC

XorNot wrote: post #3

What an utterly redundant point. If you catch and do not die from the virus then yay for you I suppose, but you'll still spread it around while you have it, you still might die from the virus, and there is literally no downside to having a better immune response when you inevitably do catch COVID-19 as we're all going to eventually. Like everything else, the goal of every single public health measure at the moment is…

I'm not an anti-vaxxer, I got vaccinated. I don't think the article is stupid. Even if you disagree with the idea (and I don't, necessarily), it's a valid question to raise, and the discussion is a productive one to have.

Re: Is catching Covid now better than more vaccine?

#69

Post by roland35 » Sat, Aug 21, 2021, 1:07 PM UTC

gunapologist99 wrote: post #41

meheleventyone wrote: post #11

Tangentially related but I’m on day 9 of COVID infection which is easily the longest I’ve been sick in years. I got two shots of Pfizer last one on the 13th of July. If the vaccine has kept this relatively mild then I’m very glad. It sucks. My main symptoms are a stuffed up face, cough, sore throat, aching body and an extremely fuzzy head that seems to come and go. I had a slightly raised temp at the start but otherw…

I am so sorry for your terrible sickness! It's probably impossible to say whether "the vaccine has kept this relatively mild", especially since you got it despite being vaccinated twice. At least earlier strains showed no or very mild symptoms in 80% of the infected, and yours doesn't sound very mild. Maybe you'd be dead if not for the vaccine? or perhaps the vaccine allowed your body to contain it to just your nose,…

"mild" in terms of delta covid mMans you don't need to go to the hospital. Mild covid still can be pretty terrible, but it at least isn't life-threatening!

Re: Is catching Covid now better than more vaccine?

#70

Post by meheleventyone » Sat, Aug 21, 2021, 1:08 PM UTC

gunapologist99 wrote: post #41

meheleventyone wrote: post #11

Tangentially related but I’m on day 9 of COVID infection which is easily the longest I’ve been sick in years. I got two shots of Pfizer last one on the 13th of July. If the vaccine has kept this relatively mild then I’m very glad. It sucks. My main symptoms are a stuffed up face, cough, sore throat, aching body and an extremely fuzzy head that seems to come and go. I had a slightly raised temp at the start but otherw…

I am so sorry for your terrible sickness! It's probably impossible to say whether "the vaccine has kept this relatively mild", especially since you got it despite being vaccinated twice. At least earlier strains showed no or very mild symptoms in 80% of the infected, and yours doesn't sound very mild. Maybe you'd be dead if not for the vaccine? or perhaps the vaccine allowed your body to contain it to just your nose,…

Well we can’t test the null hypothesis for me specifically but the data here in Iceland shows that the illness for the population at large is much less likely amongst the vaccinated and much less severe. So it’s not impossible to say at all.

And yes my symptoms are mild and suck a lot. The average length of illness in mild cases is 14 days. COVID is worse than most people (including me before getting it) think.