Vaccine experts: Covid-19 booster shots aren't needed now • Hacker News Board

Re: Vaccine experts: Covid-19 booster shots aren't needed now

#341

Post by spywaregorilla » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 4:08 PM UTC

slices wrote: post #303

spywaregorilla wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some of them are traditional inactivated virus vaccines. If that's your only point of concern, you should simply be advocating for J&J. All of them still work by teaching your own immune system.

the difference with the J&J isn't the payload (spike protein), it's the delivery mechanism (adenovirus vs. mRNA)

That's not quite correct. Neither contains the spike protein. The delivery mechanisms are two different ways to tell the cells to produce the spike proteins. The immune system then learns how to respond to the spike protein presence.

The mechanisms are the payloads. They're different formats of the spike protein recipe.

Re: Vaccine experts: Covid-19 booster shots aren't needed now

#342

Post by function_seven » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 4:08 PM UTC

refurb wrote: post #298

RHSeeger wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> obese Requires lifestyle change > alcoholics Requires lifestyle change > people who don’t take their medication Requires lifestyle change > Vaccine Requires a choice and a half day off. There is a BIG difference there.

What you call lifestyle changes I call “need to make a decision”. Patients make terrible healthcare choices all the time. If we’re going to hammer them on vaccines let’s go all in, huh? Obesity causes massive costs and burden on our healthcare system yet I don’t see people calling them idiots.

> What you call lifestyle changes I call “need to make a decision”.

Well I'd suggest not downplaying it that way. Going from a junk-food-and-soda diet to a healthy one is a huge shift in lifestyle. You don't just make a decision one day and that's that. You have to make that decision several times a day, every day, for the rest of your life.

Not getting enough exercise? You don't just sign up for a gym membership and consider it done. No, that's just the first step. Now you need to show up at the gym several times a week, and put the work in over and over again.

An alcoholic doesn't just decide to stop drinking one day, then poof they're cured. That decision is just the beginning. What follows is some mix of white knuckling in the beginning and an ever-present vigilance to maintain sobriety. It's not just "I don't drink anymore", but also "I need to come to terms with this issue or that relationship", and "I can't hang out at the bar every night anymore". It's a long-term project, not just a decision.

Getting a vaccination is not like that at all. It really is a single decision, once made, and never thought about again.

Re: Vaccine experts: Covid-19 booster shots aren't needed now

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Post by bigbob2 » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 4:08 PM UTC

Thlom wrote: post #144

pessimizer wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know why the US is never serious about these things. We don't get a day off to vote, we don't get days off to get our mandatory vaccination. But we get Juneteenth? I'm not from Texas, and where my family lived it didn't matter much that slavery was over until the 1950s. So an awkward, meaningless gesture towards black people for helping the DNC defeat Sanders is prioritized ahead of democracy and epidemic dis…

If you need a full day off work to vote you have other issues.

Sounds like you're assuming your situation applies to everyone.

Re: Vaccine experts: Covid-19 booster shots aren't needed now

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Post by kurthr » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 4:09 PM UTC

epmaybe wrote: post #95

I think this reporting is dancing around the issue, that the vaccine supply is most concentrated in countries that have essentially reached their maximum vaccination percentage. By not providing access to those developing or smaller countries, larger countries are shooting themselves in the proverbial global foot. I don’t think countries like the US and Canada aren’t trying to do that, I just think these experts woul…

I mostly agree, but these experts need to calculate how many shots this really is (~150Mil) and then look at how many shots are still needed in the rest of the world (~10Bil). So if everyone who had a single shot also got a booster, it would increase this time by 1.5 (or less since distribution and production rates increase with time)?

Prioritizing the elderly in developing nations (rather than the wealthy and politically connected) and speeding vaccine production (likely Adenovirus rather than MRNA due to encapsulation and cold-chain bottlenecks) would have order of magnitude larger effects on deaths than preventing booster shots. The number of wasted shots is closing in on the number likely to be administered.

Delaying immunization school children for the school year (barring much higher than expected immune side effects in unpublished data) is likely going to be another own-goal for the FDA/CDC.

Re: Vaccine experts: Covid-19 booster shots aren't needed now

#345

Post by alexktz » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 4:09 PM UTC

newbamboo wrote: post #338

tzs wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you have a vaccine, then your risk of death is far below that of the flu (statistically). That seems worth checking. US flu deaths per year over the last 10 years ranged from 12000 to 61000, averaging 35900 [1]. That's 3.7 to 18.6 per 100k, averaging 10.9 per 100k. Weekly COVID deaths among vaccinated people is 0.1 per 100k [2]. The flu season is typically about 8 months. A weekly death rate of 0.1 per 100k over…

I get so frustrated by this stuff. Here’s where you went wrong. Your number is not based on efficacy last week. It’s cumulative! The vaccine efficacy wanes. For those who get a vaccine 8 months ago, it’s almost worthless now. The worst part of you logic, you lump all risk groups together! A 90 year old is not a 20 year old. Argh! People have been doing this, even public health people, since the beginning of the pande…

> For those who get a vaccine 8 months ago, it’s almost worthless now.

You need to back this claim up with data please.

Re: Vaccine experts: Covid-19 booster shots aren't needed now

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Post by [deleted] » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 4:11 PM UTC

zamalek wrote: post #280

mchusma wrote: post #139

The whole booster conversation seems like a political game. If you have a vaccine, then your risk of death is far below that of the flu (statistically). If you don't have a vaccine by now, you want covid instead and this booster conversation is irrelevant. Kids are banned from taking anything. So I expect booster or no booster, frankly it just won't matter much at the population scale. I also don't understand the mas…

> Is it to protect the vaccinated? Unfortunately, yes. The unvaccinated are a fertile ground for strains to develop. Protecting the unvaccinated is in your own best interest. We're going to need new vaccines when the the virus evolves in the unvaccinated, but the vaccinated can delay that eventuality.

[deleted]

Re: Vaccine experts: Covid-19 booster shots aren't needed now

#347

Post by bigbob2 » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 4:11 PM UTC

bwship wrote: post #257

bigbob2 wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anecdotally, the CEO of my company just died of Covid.

Anecdotally, my uncle who was otherwise healthy died months after getting the jab. And my sister's husband came down with some major fatigue/fever issues recently after the jab. So again, I took my chances based on the facts I had, yet I will get downvoted because they aren't in lock step with most of HN.

Apparently my comment was also not in lock step as you say. I'm not questioning your decision but if we're providing anecdotal data points then we should provide as many as possible.

Re: Vaccine experts: Covid-19 booster shots aren't needed now

#348

Post by marricks » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 4:14 PM UTC

xboxnolifes wrote: post #317

marricks wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The flu season is typically about 8 months. A weekly death rate of 0.1 per 100k over 8 months would be 3.5 per 100k. That's still depressingly high, and the 0.1 rate doesn't is before July 17th, so wouldn't really account for the Delta variant? COVID is no joke.

How is 1/3 of a number that the vast majority of people don't even blink at "depressingly high"?

Delta was the dominant variant only by end of July so the data set for the 0.1 number could have been based mostly on a virus which is 2.5x less deadly.

We're now facing an endemic virus which, even with vaccination, approaches (or could get as bad as) the deadliness of the flu.

Re: Vaccine experts: Covid-19 booster shots aren't needed now

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Post by after_care » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 4:14 PM UTC

mchusma wrote: post #139

The whole booster conversation seems like a political game. If you have a vaccine, then your risk of death is far below that of the flu (statistically). If you don't have a vaccine by now, you want covid instead and this booster conversation is irrelevant. Kids are banned from taking anything. So I expect booster or no booster, frankly it just won't matter much at the population scale. I also don't understand the mas…

> I also don't understand the mask/booster thing now.

It’s to reduce strain on hospitals and healthcare in general, but ICU beds in particular. It’s one thing for someone to get severe covid when the healthcare system knows how to treat it and has the capacity. It’s another thing to get severe covid (or have a heart attack, or be in an auto accident) when hospitals are at full capacity. The goal of the US government has always been to flatten the curve and never to eradicate the disease.

Re: Vaccine experts: Covid-19 booster shots aren't needed now

#350

Post by jimbob45 » Tue, Sep 14, 2021, 4:14 PM UTC

bedhead wrote: post #190

delecti wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Considering the head start they had on most of the world and the vaccine supplies this can't be described as anything other than a complete and utter failure on all levels. That's probably why the GP comment described it as "their"(our) maximum vaccination percentage. The vaccine and virus have both been politicized too much, and too many people are obstinately refusing it as a result.

It feels like more and more people whom I would consider very partisan (either side) simply act out of spite nowadays. Whatever the other side wants, well, we're just going to unconditionally fight it. You saw this accelerate after Trump won with "Resist", an ethos that literally means to defy regardless of circumstances. And now you see the right's version of "Resist" by avoiding vaccinations. Why? Because screw the…

>And now you see the right's version of "Resist" by avoiding vaccinations

"I love our people, so I want our people to take the vaccines." - Trump

"As a boy, I fought polio. Today, America’s been polio-free for 40 years — thanks to vaccinations. We’ll beat Covid-19 with vaccines, too. Protect yourself and your family. Get vaccinated." - McConnell

"Democrats and the media scoffed when @realDonaldTrump said we’d have a safe and effective vaccine this year, but he kept his promise!" - Kevin McCarthy, House minority leader

All of Republican leadership is urging people to get the vaccine. Anti-vaxxers think they're on the side of Republicans but, come midterms in 14 months, they're going to figure out that they're not on anyone's side.

Edit: I would love to hear from anyone old enough to remember what happened during a time in history when a large coalition of people thought they had representation in one party or the other but actually had no representation in either party. What happened during the subsequent election?