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Pfizer board member suggests end to mask, vaccine mandates

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Re: Pfizer board member suggests end to mask, vaccine mandates

#641

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Until the CDC changed the definition of vaccine in Sept 2021, most vaccines were understood to provide sterilizing immunity against infection, not only "protection" against illness/death. Intramuscular/serum vaccines cannot stop respiratory infections, by definition. They are non-sterilizing. Only a nasal/mucosal vaccine or nasal infection can provide sterilizing immunity against a respiratory virus.

You rewriting history? The vaccine was never said to be 100% effective. Stop trying to twist reality to face your own political views.

delusion is a funny thing.

Re: Pfizer board member suggests end to mask, vaccine mandates

#642
post #512

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Done with Covid? Are you aware that vaccines are failing spectacularly with regards to Omicron infection? Hospitalizations are another story, but this notion of the vaccines ending Covid is just not holding up with new variants.

What? I thought it has been pretty clear that even with Omicron, the vaccine dramatically reduces risk. In WA, the unvaccinated are 2-4x more likely to get covid and 5-11x more likely to be hospitalized. https://www.doh.wa.gov/Portals/1/Documents/1600/coronavirus/...

I certainly hope so, but the numbers (how great the benefit is) keep getting lower. And your stats are just per population. Maybe the people who refuse to get vaccinated are also 2-3x as likely to refuse to wear masks or avoid crowds. We need real stats somehow by randomly testing populations then seeing how they fare.

Re: Pfizer board member suggests end to mask, vaccine mandates

#643
post #568
post #30

Something from the NYT mailing list yesterday: > The Covid vaccines are remarkably effective at preventing serious illness. If you’re vaccinated, your chances of getting severely sick are extremely low. Even among people 65 and older, the combination of the vaccines’ effectiveness and the Omicron variant’s relative mildness means that Covid now appears to present less danger than a normal flu. > For the unvaccinated,…

I've never heard a convincing argument about why the COVID restrictions weren't literal violations of human rights. Often I got a variant of "I'm scared we're just going to do it". Most (all?) of the arguments for it turned out to be wrong - eg, vaccination has not slowed the spread, even marginally, according to the experience in Australia where COVID tore through a highly vaccinated population. In my state (~95% ad…

I’m Australian. Vaccination and restrictions were why we never saw refrigerated containers of dead people on street corners, like NYC did in the first wave. Many people would have died or needed to be hospitalized.

Re: Pfizer board member suggests end to mask, vaccine mandates

#645

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apologies in advance for getting on my soapbox, but this has been on my mind for a while. The way in which the media has gotten everyone to say "the unvaccinated" is a 'disease' against basic science (not even getting into the divisive nature of this). I would go as far as saying if you read any paper, study, or other that refers to the "unvaccinated" as a single cohort, you are reading vaccine propaganda, not scienc…

> why are they so adamant to vaccinate those with prior infection Because the data shows they don't matter. This is the same thing as deaths due to covid vs. deaths while positive to covid. Sure some people might have been miscounted as covid deaths but actually died due to cancer/car accident/whatever. Despite this the excess deaths over the past two years is much higher than the number of covid deaths; thus showing…

My point is that it is NOT a pointless distinction, and there is a huge discrepancy between "unvaccinated - prior infection" and "unvaccinated - no infection" cohorts. Countries that track prior infection (there are a few) show this in their data, and if you separate them you will see the "unvaxxed - no infection" get worse and the other much better. If the subject matter were something less politically polarizing I'm suggesting this would be a split group in everyone's data.

Re: Pfizer board member suggests end to mask, vaccine mandates

#646

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you really think Republicans are not getting vaccinated because they “don’t trust” pharma companies?

Speaking as a Republican who has not gotten vaccinated, yes.

No post body was provided.

Re: Pfizer board member suggests end to mask, vaccine mandates

#647

The media's binary separation of populations into vax and unvax is a false dichotomy. More causal factors would be represented by: 1. Covid-recovered 2. Vaccinated 3. Partly-vaccinated ( CDC reporting bundles #3 and #4. UK reports all 4 categories separately. #1 was already a high percentage in 2021 and is now higher due to Omicron. Edit: CDC estimated pre-Omicron #1 as 146 million people (as of Oct 2021), https://ww…

It is so amazing to me how many people don't seem to recognize this. My (somewhat baseless) speculation on this is that a lot of the people in forums like HN are early adopter types who mostly work from home, and so were able to avoid exposure and got the vaccine relatively early. From this standpoint, I could see it being harder to empathize with folks who were exposed in everyday life (it's just a simple jab, I did…

> From this standpoint, I could see [..]

there are so many different standpoints you could take from the HN population.

- "HN focuses on tech; novel tech tends to be anti-regulation => HN must be anti-mandate."

- "HN focuses on engineering; engineering is often an optimization game that involves balancing tradeoffs => HN must believe COVID response relative to all the other risks we face is an over-reaction."

- and of course the one you presented.

my theory is that opinions within any group are just more divergent than people realize. some groups do a better job than others in (a) understanding that and (b) working with that. it's almost all cultural: do people in your culture publicly voice their non-conforming views, and to what degree do people in your culture update their beliefs when they hear new information?

Re: Pfizer board member suggests end to mask, vaccine mandates

#648
post #30

Something from the NYT mailing list yesterday: > The Covid vaccines are remarkably effective at preventing serious illness. If you’re vaccinated, your chances of getting severely sick are extremely low. Even among people 65 and older, the combination of the vaccines’ effectiveness and the Omicron variant’s relative mildness means that Covid now appears to present less danger than a normal flu. > For the unvaccinated,…

CDC's new paper throws a wrench in all of these arguments from NYT: https://thepulse.one/2022/01/24/cdc-admits-the-obvious-natur...

Re: Pfizer board member suggests end to mask, vaccine mandates

#649
post #30

Something from the NYT mailing list yesterday: > The Covid vaccines are remarkably effective at preventing serious illness. If you’re vaccinated, your chances of getting severely sick are extremely low. Even among people 65 and older, the combination of the vaccines’ effectiveness and the Omicron variant’s relative mildness means that Covid now appears to present less danger than a normal flu. > For the unvaccinated,…

> With COVID becoming endemic everyone is going to get antibodies Vaccines provide better protection than infection, just to be clear. It's not true that you're safe because of a previous infection. See: https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2021/s0806-vaccination-pr...

No they don't, indisputably now. See the massive 15 million people study from CDC Jan'2022 paper and here is an article that summarizes it: https://thepulse.one/2022/01/24/cdc-admits-the-obvious-natur...

Re: Pfizer board member suggests end to mask, vaccine mandates

#650
post #631

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apologies in advance for getting on my soapbox, but this has been on my mind for a while. The way in which the media has gotten everyone to say "the unvaccinated" is a 'disease' against basic science (not even getting into the divisive nature of this). I would go as far as saying if you read any paper, study, or other that refers to the "unvaccinated" as a single cohort, you are reading vaccine propaganda, not scienc…

I've also noticed this. I have covid right now. I'm double vaccinated. I was planning to get my booster shot, but now that I've had covid what's the point. It's not likely to increase my immunity and it comes with risks. At some point the government will probably change the definition of fully vaccinated to three shots and then I'll be in that unvaccinated group I usually make fun of. Somebody I know lost their job b…

>I'm very angry at the dumbasses who haven't been infected and refuse to get vaccinated, including family of mine who died because of that.

You use your dead relative as proof for your case in the same breath as calling them a dumbass.

This goes to prove a point. Does it matter if everyone is vaccinated & "safe", at the expense of our dignity and respect as a species?

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