U.S. plans to begin administering Covid-19 booster shots in September • Hacker News Board

Re: U.S. plans to begin administering Covid-19 booster shots in September

#11

Post by velcii » Tue, Aug 17, 2021, 5:05 PM UTC

fighterpilot wrote: post #9

tboyd47 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Okay, so if the binary thinking is wrong, why stop at three? Why stop at all? Does the science say we just blast our bodies with as much mRNA as we can get away with?

Elementary economic thinking answers this question. Benefits asymptote, so you'll stop at the point where the marginal benefit of an additional shot is less than the marginal financial cost, marginal opportunity cost and marginal cost of side effects all combined. That's definitely not the case before two and may not be the case before three based on data we've seen. It might be the case before four. And this doesn't…

>You'll asymptote, so you'll stop at the point where the marginal benefit of an additional shot is less than the marginal financial cost, marginal opportunity cost and marginal cost of side effects all combined.

But this is already the case for young people and people who already had covid and recovered, but we don't see them excluded from vaccinations based on their risk profile. So I think there is no reason to think that this logic will be applied more truthfully at some arbitrary time in future.

Re: U.S. plans to begin administering Covid-19 booster shots in September

#12

Post by halfjoking » Tue, Aug 17, 2021, 5:05 PM UTC

Will the two shot people lose their jobs next year if they refuse the third shot?

I’d rather have robust variety of antibodies provided by prior infection than get a leaky vaccine every 8 months. Sucks that I’m going to lose my job for that decision but having a IaaS (Immunity as a Service) subscription from Pharma sounds worse than getting longcovid again.

Re: U.S. plans to begin administering Covid-19 booster shots in September

#13

Post by velcii » Tue, Aug 17, 2021, 5:10 PM UTC

tboyd47 wrote: post #8

fighterpilot wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This binary thinking is wrong. Nobody thinks three shots will "stop" the delta variant. They think it'll lower the number of severe cases and deaths.

Okay, so if the binary thinking is wrong, why stop at three? Why stop at all? Does the science say we just blast our bodies with as much mRNA as we can get away with?

>Does the science say we just blast our bodies with as much mRNA as we can get away with?

Science does not decide things that should be applied population wide. Economics does.

If it costs less for the state (or entities who have invested in state business) to mass vaccinate its population, then it ll be done, even if it fucks you up in ways that you care about, as an individual.

And that is why people should think twice about writing of essential autonomy..

Re: U.S. plans to begin administering Covid-19 booster shots in September

#14

Post by revolvingocelot » Tue, Aug 17, 2021, 5:27 PM UTC

halfjoking wrote: post #12

Will the two shot people lose their jobs next year if they refuse the third shot? I’d rather have robust variety of antibodies provided by prior infection than get a leaky vaccine every 8 months. Sucks that I’m going to lose my job for that decision but having a IaaS (Immunity as a Service) subscription from Pharma sounds worse than getting longcovid again.

>I’d rather have robust variety of antibodies provided by prior infection than get a leaky vaccine every 8 months. Sucks that I’m going to lose my job for that decision but having a IaaS (Immunity as a Service) subscription from Pharma sounds worse than getting longcovid again.

Er, what? It sounds like you're saying that you'd rather get COVID-resistance from a bout with COVID rather than from a vaccine, but then you suggest that you've already had COVID and that you'd prefer to experience COVID complications again.

The suspicious doubletalk aside, aren't the double-vaxxed currently doomed to risk a (mild, potentially infectious) Delta experience anyway? How's the resistance gained thereby stack up?

Why's this an issue, anyway? Are you having to pay for your shots, or something? Or is this a "principled" stance?

edit: probable answers to the personal questions I have of the parent can be found in this thread of theirs a few days ago. If the events of the past year and a half weren't enough to make any readers worried about trust in social institutions, reading this will: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27986681

Re: U.S. plans to begin administering Covid-19 booster shots in September

#15

Post by evilpotatoes » Tue, Aug 17, 2021, 5:30 PM UTC

revolvingocelot wrote: post #14

halfjoking wrote: post #12

Will the two shot people lose their jobs next year if they refuse the third shot? I’d rather have robust variety of antibodies provided by prior infection than get a leaky vaccine every 8 months. Sucks that I’m going to lose my job for that decision but having a IaaS (Immunity as a Service) subscription from Pharma sounds worse than getting longcovid again.

>I’d rather have robust variety of antibodies provided by prior infection than get a leaky vaccine every 8 months. Sucks that I’m going to lose my job for that decision but having a IaaS (Immunity as a Service) subscription from Pharma sounds worse than getting longcovid again. Er, what? It sounds like you're saying that you'd rather get COVID-resistance from a bout with COVID rather than from a vaccine, but then you…

That's a really good question I'd like the answer to. I was reading that natural infection tends to create a stronger response against the nucleocapsid for t-cells.

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.04.19.21255739v...

Is this an either or thing? Will your immune system develop proper full immunity after getting vaccine + delta ?

Re: U.S. plans to begin administering Covid-19 booster shots in September

#16

Post by iamthepieman » Tue, Aug 17, 2021, 5:31 PM UTC

fighterpilot wrote: post #9

tboyd47 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Okay, so if the binary thinking is wrong, why stop at three? Why stop at all? Does the science say we just blast our bodies with as much mRNA as we can get away with?

Elementary economic thinking answers this question. Benefits asymptote, so you'll stop at the point where the marginal benefit of an additional shot is less than the marginal financial cost, marginal opportunity cost and marginal cost of side effects all combined. That's definitely not the case before two and may not be the case before three based on data we've seen. It might be the case before four. And this doesn't…

This is basically what is done with the flu shot although it's a very different mechanism in the actual vaccine.

Re: U.S. plans to begin administering Covid-19 booster shots in September

#17

Post by QuadmasterXLII » Tue, Aug 17, 2021, 5:32 PM UTC

halfjoking wrote: post #12

Will the two shot people lose their jobs next year if they refuse the third shot? I’d rather have robust variety of antibodies provided by prior infection than get a leaky vaccine every 8 months. Sucks that I’m going to lose my job for that decision but having a IaaS (Immunity as a Service) subscription from Pharma sounds worse than getting longcovid again.

????????

Re: U.S. plans to begin administering Covid-19 booster shots in September

#18

Post by revolvingocelot » Tue, Aug 17, 2021, 5:41 PM UTC

AndrewBissell wrote: post #4

chitowneats wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They can't. No clinical trials. It's a hail mary.

I feel like "hail mary" would imply some sort of negative consequences for failure in this case. But short of the third shot just dropping dead everyone who takes it (unlikely), it will be easy enough with our media ecosystem to suppress adverse events and handwave away any problems with efficacy. I mean, we're already seeing numerous countries experience higher cases and hospitalizations with 50%+ vax rates than the…

>I mean, we're already seeing numerous countries experience higher cases and hospitalizations with 50%+ vax rates than they ever did before the vaccine rollouts but hardly anyone is asking "hey, what's going on here?"

There's no reason to ask because we actually do know what's going on here. The r0 of OG COVID is ~3, higher than the flu. The r0 of Delta COVID is between 5 and 9, and the CDC currently estimates it at 8.5. Worse, Delta generates more, and more serious, hospitalizations (among the unvaccinated). [0]

Which countries are experiencing hospitalization rates higher than pre-vaccine times? More importantly, do those trends disappear if you look at areas within those countries that are highly- or poorly-vaccinated?

[0] https://health-desk.org/articles/how-contagious-is-the-delta...

Re: U.S. plans to begin administering Covid-19 booster shots in September

#19

Post by csb6 » Tue, Aug 17, 2021, 5:46 PM UTC

halfjoking wrote: post #12

Will the two shot people lose their jobs next year if they refuse the third shot? I’d rather have robust variety of antibodies provided by prior infection than get a leaky vaccine every 8 months. Sucks that I’m going to lose my job for that decision but having a IaaS (Immunity as a Service) subscription from Pharma sounds worse than getting longcovid again.

Who said you are going to lose your job? You seem to accept that as a fact, but I’m not sure where you are getting confirmation of this.

Are you just assuming that all employers will require you to get a booster shot in the future, even though as of now most employers do not require you to get even a single COVID shot?

Re: U.S. plans to begin administering Covid-19 booster shots in September

#20

Post by arpyzo » Tue, Aug 17, 2021, 6:16 PM UTC

criticaltinker wrote: post #10

> Global health leaders including Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director-general of the World Health Organization, have pleaded with developed countries not to administer boosters given that most of the world’s population hasn’t received even a single dose. [1] > U.S regulators authorized a third dose of COVID-19 vaccines by Pfizer Inc (PFE.N)-BioNTech and Moderna Inc (MRNA.O) on Friday for people with compromised immu…

Early on in the pandemic it looked like things might unfold differently. You can read about why that didn't happen here:

https://newrepublic.com/article/162000/bill-gates-impeded-gl...