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Reaching ‘Herd Immunity’ from Covid Is Unlikely in the U.S., Experts Now Believe

nytimes.com

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Re: Reaching ‘Herd Immunity’ from Covid Is Unlikely in the U.S., Experts Now Believe

#41

Post by aphextron »

There's a fine line between bravery and stupidity.

Stupidity was going about your normal life, and getting mad about the new reality we were faced with when this whole thing started. The balance of risking your life for the sake of having fun was heavily skewed toward stupid.

Bravery is beginning to build a new semblance of normalcy in a post vaccine world, and attempting to move on. We have the science, we know it works, we just have to trust it now and be brave. The balance of risking a mild flu-like infection at worst for the sake having fun has flipped toward being brave for people who are vaccinated.

This virus is here to stay with us for the rest of the history of humanity. But we know how to beat it now and a fully vaccinated person is clinically proven to be at minimal risk.

Re: Reaching ‘Herd Immunity’ from Covid Is Unlikely in the U.S., Experts Now Believe

#42

Post by dec0dedab0de »

lol768 wrote: post #2

> Polls show that about 30 percent of the U.S. population is still reluctant to be vaccinated. That number is expected to improve but probably not enough. “It is theoretically possible that we could get to about 90 percent vaccination coverage, but not super likely, I would say,” said Marc Lipsitch, an epidemiologist at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. This is really poor, positive vaccine sentiment in…

Part of it is that many Americans loudly distrust the government, and other systems of power. This isn't all that irrational, because these institutions have routinely proven themselves to be untrustworty.

Then there are people who are normally on board with vaccines, who are reluctant for covid because it is brand new. Just like any sysadmin worth their salt doesn't blindly install every update the moment they come out. If I didn't have a compromised immune system I probably would have waited at least another year before getting my shots.

So sure, it's selfish, but its not stupid.

Re: Reaching ‘Herd Immunity’ from Covid Is Unlikely in the U.S., Experts Now Believe

#43

Post by josephcsible »

don-code wrote: post #35

I'd love if someone broke down _reasons_ for vaccine hesitancy. It seems like the strategies we should develop for addressing them would be different, and that there shouldn't be a one-size-fits-all strategy, as we're trying to do today. So far, I personally have encountered the following viewpoints in my family and peer group (none of which I share) - in decreasing order of how much credence I'll give them: 1. I'm p…

For point 3, that's true of the Johnson and Johnson vaccine, but not the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines.

Also, what about this reason? "I don't think the vaccine is effective, since we still have to wear masks and socially distance after getting it, so I'm not going to take the risk that it might be unsafe."

Re: Reaching ‘Herd Immunity’ from Covid Is Unlikely in the U.S., Experts Now Believe

#44

Post by kickout »

losvedir wrote: post #18

Ah, well in that case I guess it's a sure bet that we'll reach it. Betting against the experts hasn't been such a bad idea through this whole dismal ordeal. Let's hope, anyway, because that second shot is a doozy and I sure don't want to have to repeat that every year. I suspect, though, if this does become endemic, they'll tweak the dosage a bit of the vaccine, and it might be akin to only needing the first shot (wh…

I see you're getting downvoted (probably for the snark). But yea, the experts in this COVID ordeal have been less than accurate (or congruent even).

Re: Reaching ‘Herd Immunity’ from Covid Is Unlikely in the U.S., Experts Now Believe

#47

Post by retrac »

minikites wrote: post #33
mr_cyborg wrote: post #28

I wanted to add that a lot of the people I know who are “vaccine hesitant” are just waiting a little longer to see how things go. I don’t see a whole lot of representation of folks who intend to get the vaccine this summer when I read publications and articles about it, but I would wager that there’s more people intending to get it but not quite yet than we think.

So in other words, people like that want to wait and see how it goes for all of the expendable people before they try it themselves, because they're the protagonist of reality.

I mean... Yes? That's how it goes with experimental drugs. Let's say it's March 2020. They've whipped up the first batch of mRNA which will hopefully induce spike protein production. Never before tried in humans. But it didn't kill the rats! How eager would you be to take that shot?

Like don't get me wrong. We should have begun human experiments with some brave volunteers far sooner and with more recklessness, given the stakes. But no one really wants to be the first dozen, or thousand, or in the first long-term study on side effects.

Re: Reaching ‘Herd Immunity’ from Covid Is Unlikely in the U.S., Experts Now Believe

#48

Post by laurent92 »

mr_cyborg wrote: post #28

I wanted to add that a lot of the people I know who are “vaccine hesitant” are just waiting a little longer to see how things go. I don’t see a whole lot of representation of folks who intend to get the vaccine this summer when I read publications and articles about it, but I would wager that there’s more people intending to get it but not quite yet than we think.

France here, I’m just waiting for the end of the state of emergency + two months. I’ll vaccinate when the press is free to discuss the problems (and does it).

I estimate we can’t know the truth about vaccines as long as the press is mandated by law to say what the president mandates them to say, and there is no reason to trust a president who holds his “conseil des ministres” in a bunker (“conseil de défense sanitaire”, jail time for anyone who discloses the contents - seriously why do they have to hide).

It’s not like they didn’t lie to us during Chernobyl or by saying “masks are medically useless, according to le conseil sanitaire” (words of President Macron in April 2020 - our current president) so they have 0% track record of being good custodians of truth. Research is supposed to be dirty with plenty of disagreeing voices. As long as we see scientists agreeing in the press: It’s not science, it’s staged.

During the period of blood transfusions with AIDS, we actively contaminated hundreds of thousands here in France, fully knowing what we were doing, and masquerading all of it in the press. I’m pro-vax in the end, but concerning rushed vaccines with no freedom of press to disclose scandals: I’ll just wait it off, thanks.

Re: Reaching ‘Herd Immunity’ from Covid Is Unlikely in the U.S., Experts Now Believe

#49

Post by aaron-santos »

don-code wrote: post #35

I'd love if someone broke down _reasons_ for vaccine hesitancy. It seems like the strategies we should develop for addressing them would be different, and that there shouldn't be a one-size-fits-all strategy, as we're trying to do today. So far, I personally have encountered the following viewpoints in my family and peer group (none of which I share) - in decreasing order of how much credence I'll give them: 1. I'm p…

It is important to consider vaccine hesitancy in marginalized communities. A reaction to this by an outsider, may include questions like, "But these are some of the people who are most affected by not vaccination." Which can be true, doesn't address their concerns. As always, this is a generalized statement. Marginalized communities are not monoliths. Statements about groups don't always speak for everyone in that group.

> Some communities of color, including Black communities, display higher levels of COVID vaccine hesitancy than the general population, due in part to an egregious history of medical maltreatment—from the Tuskegee experiments to forced sterilization, to the nonconsensual and uncompensated use of stem cells.[1]

[1] - https://www.templehealth.org/services/population-health/temp...

Re: Reaching ‘Herd Immunity’ from Covid Is Unlikely in the U.S., Experts Now Believe

#50

Post by thu2111 »

beisner wrote: post #20
lol768 wrote: post #2

> Polls show that about 30 percent of the U.S. population is still reluctant to be vaccinated. That number is expected to improve but probably not enough. “It is theoretically possible that we could get to about 90 percent vaccination coverage, but not super likely, I would say,” said Marc Lipsitch, an epidemiologist at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. This is really poor, positive vaccine sentiment in…

It's not an education problem. It's an ideology problem. A huge fraction of the country has basically lost all faith in public and academic institutions. In these polarized times, when many leaders that institution-skeptics listen to decided to make COVID a political issue in the ongoing culture war, listening to public health recommendations (including masking, vaccination) is akin to "letting the other side win". E…

I don't think it was "institution skeptics" who made COVID a political issue. How many months did it take before academics were claiming that anti-lockdown protests were dangerous and must not happen but BLM protests were to be encouraged, because "systemic racism" is a public health issue? Not many. How many other academics condemned this blatant politicization of science? Not enough.

Lockdowns don't work: US states that locked down hard have not seen different results from those that had far fewer restrictions. Sweden has been less impacted than the UK and many other European countries that locked down hard. Have academic institutions ever acknowledged that, or accepted that their predictions were wrong? They do not. The ones I've seen just claim anyone who disagrees with them is an ideologically motivated anti-science conspiracy theorist.

These things are not the right way to re-assure people institutions are on top of things. They clearly are not.

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