FDA Approves First Covid-19 Vaccine • Hacker News Board

Re: FDA Approves First Covid-19 Vaccine

#821

Post by ljf » Mon, Aug 23, 2021, 6:28 PM UTC

megous wrote: post #812

ljf wrote: post #806

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess we can look to places like Israel where there is nearly 100 percent, and the UK where there is a very high vaccination rate esp in the over 50s. If you go to the gp/doctor and you tell them you are suffering issues after a vaccine they have to (by law) pass that on to the regulator and to the vaccine manufacturer. In Israel and in the UK reports to doctors about longer term side effects of the vaccine are wit…

Yes, but where are the data? What low means? What is expected range? Just 1% would be a lot of people to have longer term side effects. Etc.

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/regulatory-approv...

Question, do you personally know anyone with long term health issues that they believe we're caused by the vaccine?

Re: FDA Approves First Covid-19 Vaccine

#822

Post by dfxm12 » Mon, Aug 23, 2021, 6:28 PM UTC

goostavos wrote: post #792

dfxm12 wrote: post #391

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What type of responses did you get? I agree, engaging people is a good way to go. I don't know any anti-vaxxers personally, so I have to actively work to remind myself they might not all have the same reasons as the ones I know impersonally (who all happen to be full of misinfo, like Eric Clapton, et al.). There are no silver bullets that lead to peace and harmony, obviously, but a greater understanding of each other…

Pure fwiw, I currently do not plan to get the vaccine (but reserve the right to change my mind! ^_^). I'm not anti-vax by any means. I'm simply just hesitant with this vax, but encourage others with a different risk profile to get it. It boils down to a really muddy mix of small things that all sum up to a decision against it. For instance, I'm not the risk group and, due to being super medically conservative for _ev…

Why do you let the opinions of some out group determine your behavior? If you're looking for advice, is there someone you trust with a credentialed medical opinion you can talk to about this instead, like your family physician?

Also, do keep in mind the premise here is that if enough of us get vaccinated as fast as possible, we can, among possibly other things, stop the spread of the disease, stop variants from forming and also lighten the load of hospitals so they can treat more people, including those without COVID. I'm all for curiosity, but is it worth it in this case? Also, you can still observe other peoples' behaviors if you get the vaccine. Even if you want to just observe the people you're close with interact with you directly, you can get it and not tell them.

Re: FDA Approves First Covid-19 Vaccine

#823

Post by JakeTheAndroid » Mon, Aug 23, 2021, 6:29 PM UTC

supportlocal4h wrote: post #325

ceejayoz wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why don't we lockdown our highways when there are 600,000 deaths from auto accidents? We mandate seat belts, air bags, guard rails, road construction standards, backup cameras, crumple zones, and quite a few other elements involved in road safety. Per-mile road deaths have been on a precipitous decline for decades due to ongoing increases in safety mandates. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_vehicle_fatality_rate…

So 35000 deaths per year is ok? 100000? 250000? 1.5 million (diabetes)? 500000 hospitalizations (influenza)? What deserves such incredible non-stop daily attention? Answer: whatever makes the most money.

well there are legal consequences of causing or being part of an accident, unlike spreading COVID or Influenza. So we don't consider road deaths okay by nearly any metric. If you want to call out bad comparisons your position should be included in that. Not only do we put tons of safety precautions in place on the road, people get in serious trouble when they have been negligent. And we also have tons of companies currently trying to remove the human driver error from the equation entirely.

The idea of conflating other causes of death with COVID is just perfection over progress. Sure there are other systems that aren't perfect but that doesn't mean COVID isn't worth addressing.

Re: FDA Approves First Covid-19 Vaccine

#824

Post by walterbell » Mon, Aug 23, 2021, 6:29 PM UTC

ericcholis wrote: post #224

mattbrewsbytes wrote: post #31

An interesting, short read is the difference between Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) and the full FDA approval[0]. Basically it is manufacturing, funding and red tape being the difference, nothing about safety or clinical trials differs. In software terms, EUA is parallel tracked sprints for clinical trials and manufacturing at same time vs. regular approval is Waterfall where manufacturing occurs after approval. […

One of the anti-vaxx or vaxx hesitant arguments is that Pharma can't be sued for damages under EUA. I'm honestly not sure how true that is precisely.

Other parties can be sued, e.g. universities and companies with un-scientific mandates for an intramuscular vaccine that does not provide sterilizing immunity (e.g. current Covid vaccines), while they fail to recognize natural immunity that provides both nasal/mucosal and blood/serum antibodies, https://nclalegal.org/2021/08/george-mason-univ-caves-to-ncl...

> "NCLA is pleased that GMU granted Professor Zywicki’s medical exemption, which we believe it only did because he filed this lawsuit. According to GMU, with the medical exemption, Prof. Zywicki may continue serving the GMU community, as he has for more than two decades, without receiving a medically unnecessary vaccine and without undue burden. Nevertheless, NCLA remains dismayed by GMU’s refusal—along with many other public and private universities and other employers—to recognize that the science establishes beyond any doubt that natural immunity is as robust or more so than vaccine immunity.”

Re: FDA Approves First Covid-19 Vaccine

#825

Post by criticaltinker » Mon, Aug 23, 2021, 6:30 PM UTC

handoflixue wrote: post #757

criticaltinker wrote: post #740

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just to be clear, you're arguing against evidence based medicine and instead advocating for hasty generalization and jumping to conclusions based on the absence of evidence. Somewhere between our two points is an optimal middle ground. The holy grail of exclusively evidence based interventions is lofty no doubt, and we'll have to do the best with what we know right now, but to aim for anything less is quite difficult…

I can't fathom how you could misinterpret a post saying "there's a difference between evidence and peer reviewed academic standards" to conclude that I've abandoned the idea of evidence entirely. I don't need an academic, peer-reviewed study to tell me that using this site is safe. I don't need one to tell me that masks are safe. It's NICE to have such things, and I'm NOT opposed to them, but they are also NOT necess…

You're attacking a straw man here, my original comment was about the lack of evidence for vaccine safety in certain understudied sub-populations.

> we are in fact at a point where we can conclude that the vaccine is significantly safer than going unvaccinated

You keep coming back to "vaccinated versus unvaccinated" rhetoric and using irrelevant logical reasoning to argue that we should hastily generalize safety results to these sub-populations without citing any scientific literature supporting your claim.

The reality of the situation is a lot more complex, and it's obvious you're neglecting these nuances because for example, you fail to acknowledge how immunity acquired through natural infection is a major factor in the tradeoffs of vaccinating these understudied sub-populations.

I'm open to further debate, but I won't continue responding if you continue to raise the same unsupported arguments.

Re: FDA Approves First Covid-19 Vaccine

#826

Post by yupper32 » Mon, Aug 23, 2021, 6:31 PM UTC

ghiculescu wrote: post #734

yupper32 wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the weird, Orwellian ways that the government talks about it, has turned me against the booster. You desperately need to take a step back and look at yourself and how you evaluate things. You decided to go against the booster because of your feelings, not because of science. You want government decisions to be guided by science, and yet you are very clearly anti-science with your decision making. > To many of you h…

Trump was still president then, but the question was hypothetical. Would your answer change if he was re-elected?

Given everything else is the same, I would support Trump doing the same vaccine requirements that Biden has done, if Trump hypothetically won the election.

If Trump succeeded at gutting the FDA and installing people like Scott Atlas in order to override the career officials and experts at the FDA, or something similar, then yes my answer would likely be different.

Again, the POTUS at the time has nothing to do with the decision making.

Re: FDA Approves First Covid-19 Vaccine

#827

Post by thehappypm » Mon, Aug 23, 2021, 6:31 PM UTC

thex10 wrote: post #534

thehappypm wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't agree with this, in general. We shouldn't give up our freedoms. "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." (Benjamin Franklin) We should be motivated by a desire to help one another, and resist when freedoms are removed. That being said, if businesses want to exercise their freedoms to make life more difficult for the unvaccinated, s…

That's a nice thought, but I can't cosign, unless Ben happens to also have an informed opinion on societal life under the tyranny of communicable diseases.

Ben knew much more about disease than any of us do.

Re: FDA Approves First Covid-19 Vaccine

#828

Post by handoflixue » Mon, Aug 23, 2021, 6:32 PM UTC

throwawayzz007 wrote: post #816

handoflixue wrote: post #653

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Being able to sue. Why is suing vital? What's insufficient about the existing National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program? https://www.hrsa.gov/vaccine-compensation/index.html (I'm genuinely unfamiliar with any flaws it might have) > Many rights have been taken away (some permanently) What rights have been permanently removed? For that matter, what RIGHTS have been even temporarily suspended?

> What's insufficient about the existing National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program? Max compensation is $250k. Life insurance values my life far more. Documents are under seal. Payouts are paid by the tax payer, not the manufacturers. Cases are heard by HHS and defended by DOJ (more taxes footing the bill). HHS has repeatedly refused to add certain injuries to their compensation tables even after CDC directed rese…

I'd heard others arguing for it and hadn't personally investigated it, so I appreciate the response!

I do think that given my own evaluation of the risks and rewards, the NVICP is perfectly sufficient for my own needs, but I can certainly see how one would be opposed to this on a systemic level, or if you believe the risk-reward ratio skews differently

Re: FDA Approves First Covid-19 Vaccine

#829

Post by megous » Mon, Aug 23, 2021, 6:33 PM UTC

ljf wrote: post #821

megous wrote: post #812

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but where are the data? What low means? What is expected range? Just 1% would be a lot of people to have longer term side effects. Etc.

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/regulatory-approv... Question, do you personally know anyone with long term health issues that they believe we're caused by the vaccine?

Yes. That's the reason why I'm searching every once in a while for some studies.

Re: FDA Approves First Covid-19 Vaccine

#830

Post by handoflixue » Mon, Aug 23, 2021, 6:35 PM UTC

nsxwolf wrote: post #756

handoflixue wrote: post #653

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Being able to sue. Why is suing vital? What's insufficient about the existing National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program? https://www.hrsa.gov/vaccine-compensation/index.html (I'm genuinely unfamiliar with any flaws it might have) > Many rights have been taken away (some permanently) What rights have been permanently removed? For that matter, what RIGHTS have been even temporarily suspended?

Many people consider the freedom of movement without constantly having to show papers to be a right, even if it's not explicitly codified in some law or constitution. I could say I have a right to breathe air and someone would probably come around and tell me I'm wrong, but most people have some intuition for what a "natural" right is, and bristle when something encroaches on those.

I don't think anyone is stopping you from breathing air. Interstate travel is still open. I'm allowed to walk around my neighborhood. No one is requiring me to show "papers" for any of this.

I know not everyone has the same set of restrictions on them, so I'm genuinely trying to understand if I'm missing something about how other areas are behaving. I know Australia is at the "papers, please" curfew stage, and that definitely bothers me a lot, but I haven't heard of anything like that in the USA.