It is absolutely your choice. But do remember that (although they would never admit it), the most vocal pro-restriction voices will be smiling at your decision, because you form a pool of unvaccinated adults that can be pointed to as evidence to support other restrictions. Indeed several of the points in your post (and I can see you’ve given it a lot of thought - probably more than me, to be fair!) are points made most forcefully by the pro-restriction lobby, such as the effect on onward transmission. The larger the pool of unvaccinated people is, the more persuasive calls to “protect them” are. See the recent regression in the US.
Well, the truth is the truth - *if* it is the truth - even if I'd rather not particularly be associated with the groups saying it. Nothing new there, I've been getting used to that over the past year-and-a-bit.
But I do see a lot of doubt for example about the CDC studies they were using to justify reintroducing masks - doubt which is perfectly justified given the rubbish they've come out with previously. I guess time will tell.
If any part of you is avoiding the vaccine in order to spite people who exaggerate about the individual severity of the virus, I’d suggest the opposite will be far more effective.
Well, fortunately it isn't. My decision is entirely based upon *my* medical history and *my* doubts given the unknown long-term safety of these vaccines, plus ethical issues around their manufacture and testing. The decision is entirely based on my own analysis of my own health interests - as it *ought* to be for everyone. For the same reason I haven't ever told anyone to take, or not take, this vaccine, or indeed any other medical treatment - that decision ought to be entirely up to the individual.
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I'm not particularly reassured by the fact that it hasn't been seen yet, because it is only likely to be a serious issue after antibodies have waned, which is only just starting to happen even in the earliest of those vaccinated. As the article you've linked to says '
{the best known route for ADE} occurs when non-neutralizing antibodies generated by past infection or vaccination fail to shut down the pathogen upon re-exposure' - ie. after the original antibody 'hit' from the vaccine is over.
As for the risk then from variants, the comment in that article is '
To date, there's really no evidence of ADE with the COVID-19 vaccines. It's all theoretical,' which is good so far, but doesn't entirely reassure...
Also, do you realise that antibodies are not the key to fighting this virus, T-cells are?
Yes, which is why I find all the talk of boosters is rather confusing/concerning.
Find out about the COVID-19 vaccination if you're pregnant, breastfeeding or might get pregnant in the future.
www.nhs.uk
The problem there is that there is pretty much no evidence about this *at all* - pregnant women were explicitly excluded from the clinical trials.
Note that I'm not suggesting there is an issue here - but it is a good example of something that, if it did happen, would not immediately be apparent.
Isn't any vaccine a "clinical trial" by that definition?
In most cases we at least wait for stage 3 of the clinical trials to be over before rolling out to the general population. For these vaccines the stage 3 trials aren't over until late 2022/early 2023. The whole point of stage 3 trials is to test the efficacy and safety in a large-enough group of people that reasonable statistical conclusions can be drawn.
As I've said a number of times before, in this particular case I totally support the rollout of the vaccines for those that need and/or want them before all these important stages were complete. But when we start talking about mandates, or vaccine passports, or even free pizzas, before the usual processes are complete, than that is totally wrong.
It's going fantastically; what's the alternative?
Vaccinate those who are vulnerable to the disease and let the others catch it naturally. Just as we do with flu each year.
But this is deflecting from the real aim of vaccines.
I agree here. The aim of this vaccine in particular is to reduce severity of symptoms in those who catch the disease. So far they appear to be pretty good at that. But the waters are totally muddied by pushing it on people who don't need it, along with things like 'vaccine passports' which imply the vaccines are effective at doing things that they're not.
A reduction in transmission of 50% would still be significant, but the data we are seeing suggests it's better than that, also people appear to be less infectious and for a shorter duration.
But this is focusing on something that is not even the primary purpose of vaccines.
True, but it is relevant to whether vaccine passports are of any use whatever (trying to stay vaguely on topic
Vaccine passports are not appropriate but in arguing against them I do not think we should be dismissing the importance of vaccines; we should not be denying the effectiveness of them; we should not be questioning their safety (they are very safe; the alternative is for people to face a natural infection without any prior vaccination as this virus is NOT going to go away)
If the government are going to go down the route of requiring people undergo medical treatment to do 'normal' things I think it is required to examine the effectiveness and safety of that medical treatment. That's part of 'informed consent', which is still a vital part of the relationship between the individual and medicine.
I don't agree with it, but this isn't a reason to argue against the vaccines themselves.
I think it is a reason to question why, if the vaccines do what we're told they do, the boosters are supposedly 'necessary'.
There are articles which look into this in detail such as:
A key issue as we move closer to ending the pandemic is determining more precisely how long people exposed to SARS-CoV-2, the COVID-19 virus, will make neutralizing antibodies against this dangerou…
directorsblog.nih.gov
Protecting Health, Saving Lives—Millions at a Time.
www.jhsph.edu
www.nature.com
But for example take this quote
Studies have shown that people who have been infected can benefit significantly from vaccination. It gives them a strong, lasting immunity boost. After receiving the first dose of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine, they have immunity levels comparable to those of uninfected people who have received their second dose.
Is that surprising - that sounds like exactly what I'd expect. Doesn't that just show that the body is good at creating antibodies after the first exposure - whether natural, or via the vaccine? Why wouldn't the body be as good at doing that if exposed to the infection a second time, rather than via the vaccine? I'm not sure what the 'benefit' is here, other than perhaps having some bonus antibodies for a few months, which I suppose could be useful if you're then infected *again*, but only during those few months.
This varies massively for different diseases. In some cases you get sterilising immunity through natural infection, while in others natural infection is vastly inferior to vaccination.
Doesn't that depend on the 'quality' of the vaccination though? I've seen quite a bit of concern from a number of virologists that focusing the vaccines specifically on the 'spike' isn't the correct long-term approach and something broader would be better.
While immunity through vaccination gives better protection than through a natural infection, we will be able to generate an even broader immune response once we have also had a natural infection in addition to having been vaccinated.
Perhaps. I suspect the immunity will be different depending on the order of when stuff happens. Whether that is better, again time will tell I guess.
The evidence so far is that it will give better long term immunity, especially if the first and second doses are spread out over a period of at least 8 weeks.
Again, I'm not convinced we can evaluate long-term immunity in any meaningful way yet, given these vaccines have not been around for anything like the long-term.
It's not a case of 'overwriting' as such; you can get a broader immune response.
But is 'broader' always better, or does it for example increase the risk of creating non-neutralising antibodies and hence possibly ADE?
This is completely fictional and untrue. If you read this somewhere, I'd stop reading your source!
No, just a thought experiment
Our bodies are not designed to constantly have antibodies against all known pathogens circulating at high levels.
I agree, which is one of the reasons I find the booster shots idea rather concerning.
The message is clear: anyone who has already had Covid gets a huge boost after a single dose of a vaccine. A second dose is probably not needed, at last not from an immunological point of view.
It makes no sense to claim that people who have had a natural infection do not benefit from vaccination though; they clearly do.
Well, similar to what I said above it looks like they produce a lot of antibodies when vaccinated if they've already had it; wouldn't we expect that to be the case? All that seems to show to me is that the natural infection is giving them good protection already.
The stuff about B- and T-cells is more interesting but I'm not sure what they're saying it means (eg. the 'useful' B-cell 'evolution' mentioned seems to be a result of the natural infection, not the subsequent vaccination).
But getting vaccinated is not going along with authoritarianism.
It is if you're only doing it because you won't be allowed to travel otherwise, or go to a nightclub, or keep your job. Which is exactly what we're now talking about.
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Big Pharma. Big Pharma have largely ignored vaccines, because they are not a particularly profitable market for them. They cost a hell of a lot to develop (like all pharmaceutical products), and don't generate repeat business in the way that medicines do.
That certainly isn't the case now! Look at how much Pfizer have made over the past year, or the share price of Moderna. And with 'boosters' they're setting up a guaranteed massive revenue stream, possibly for decades to come.
I have tremendous respect for their scientific firepower at the same time that I am uncomfortable about their approach to business.
Yes, that's fair, I agree.
Bodily autonomy. We agree on that being vitally important, though draw our lines in slightly different places.
Again fair. I disagree with your position, as you do with mine, but I understand it.
Proportionality. This is for me key. We've seen a disease that, from the starting blocks, has killed vast numbers of people in just over a year. The impact of that disease has been dramatic, and everywhere that's had significant measured outbreaks has seen massive impact on society even without lockdowns. That's with an IFR of a tenth of what you suggest as a threshold. Vaccines give us an option of, in the worst plausible case, mitigating that to a minimal level and addressing the genuine impact that this highly transmissible disease has on the ability of hospitals to function effectively - and therefore giving society the chance to operate freely.
Society has previously operated freely throughout significantly worse pandemics than this. That it has not this time was a political choice. Of course it is bad when a pandemic comes along and people die, but they do, and historically this isn't really a particularly notable pandemic. The idea that we should effectively stop society while we wait for vaccines to hopefully ride to the rescue for a pandemic - particularly one of this (lack of) severity - is a very dangerous precedent.
Finally, I dismissed Hart Group, not because I wasn't willing to engage with their claims, but because their way of working is so fundamentally dishonest that their claims don't merit that effort.
As is your right. Though looking at their membership, I see a lot of people I have lot of time for (notably David Paton and Malcolm Kendrick in particular) so I'm going to continue listening to what they have to say.
Vaccine efficacy.
@yorkie's posted at length on that, and his posts reflects all that I've seen from credible sources. I also reiterate the point of my mathematical thought experiment - that vaccination delivers protection from infection and severe illness with massively fewer side effects than naturally acquired immunity.
I agree that this is *currently* the case, but I've dealt with this and my other concerns in my massive response to yorkie above, so I won't reiterate.
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For the umpteenth time, many of those who haven't been vaccinated have made that decision after giving the matter a considerable amount of thought. It really isn't a case of "can't be bothered".
Exactly so. With the current coercion and mooted restrictions, not taking the vaccine is by no means 'the easy option'. You face losing friends, and in some cases family. You face no longer being able to travel abroad. You may soon not be able to go to a nightclub, or a cinema, or a pub, or a restaurant. You may be facing losing your job. That's not remotely a set of trivial things.
Given that everyone I know who hasn't taken the vaccine has done so after conscious thought, I'm not sure a free pizza will make that much difference.
I personally know three people who have no intention of taking the vaccine any time soon (well, two plus myself) and I know that we have all given the matter a good deal of consideration.
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A bizarre combination of the desperate (weren't they on a drive to make us eat more healthily last week? Do pizza and McDonalds feel like joined-up-thinking on that one?) and the sinister.
Once again though, we see a scheme - for now, for once using carrot rather than stick - that is normalising the idea of showing off our health credentials to all and sundry. Will the vaccine passports be used to obtain these discounts?
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Anyone who wants to get vaccinated in this country can do so with little difficulty. I was even stopped outside the NEC this afternoon by an NHS nurse asking me if I wanted to get a Pfizer vaccination (having already had two, I declined).
Indeed - I've passed at least 3 walk-in centres in the last two weeks. Most bizarrely, there were people in the Wood Green shopping centre on Saturday shouting out at people passing to get their vaccine there and then, as if they were trying to get you to switch electricity provider or buy some apples or something. Doesn't seem much like 'informed consent' to me. Do these centres even have sufficient access to your medical records to determine if there is some medical reason why you shouldn't be vaccinated?
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I feel that's a Political, rather than immunological decision.
But there are two big problems with that, if true.
Firstly people should only receive boosters if there is a proven medical need. If there is not, then administering a booster program is unethical, because any medical treatment has an element of risk.
Secondly, why are the Goverment still pointlessly throwing money around like there's no tomorrow, as opposed to actually trying to get us back to 'normal'?
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I don’t know the official medical answer. But one reason may be to ensure that people who think they have had a COVID19 Corona virus infection, but who actually did not have it, still get vaccinated so that they do get (increased) protection.
I suppose this is a reason (we considered others above in this very long post), but except in those vulnerable to the disease, this seems like overkill.
Another reason may be, to ensure that the bodies immune system is ‘reminded’ to continue to produce antibodies. I don’t know what the current research has found, but there was previously a suspicion that within three to six months, the natural protection by the immune system may wane.
From antibodies, yes. That's fairly standard behaviour as far as I know. But the body then remembers how to make them again when necessary - or at least it does when naturally infected, and/or after most vaccines. If that wasn't the case you'd continually need 'booster' vaccines for everything you've ever been vaccinated against, or indeed been infected with.
Maybe because governments are concerned that until nearly everyone has some protection from the COVID19 Corona virus, there could be another wave of infections which if really bad would result in another lockdown being needed…
In case you have not noticed, governments generally don’t like lots more money going out than is coming in…
It may have been true in the past, but I can't say I've noticed that over the last 18 months at all! Something has changed quite dramatically, well out of proportion to the severity of the pandemic. And even when we could move on, they keep on ploughing endless sums of money into boosters, track and trace and all the rest. It is all rather odd.
I don’t think anyone really knows yet. Hence it’s better to be ready with boosters rather than be caught out…
But it seems we're going ahead with the boosters without waiting to find out.
Again, it’s likely to be far too soon for anyone to really know. We do know with some viruses, that the more that the bodies immune system is required to fight off an infection, the more likely it is to be ready to fight should you be exposed again.
Is it wise though to keep on 'priming' the body to fight the same thing over and over? Will that have an effect on how it fights other things?
Do you actually know of any vaccinations where there have been found to be any significant long term effects? The whole point of a vaccine is to trigger the immune system to attack it. So as I understand it, once your immune system has ramped up enough to ‘defeat’ it, the body will break it down and it will be removed just like any other debris in your blood.
In the last 25 years, RotaShield and Pandemrix are two cases of vaccines that had to be withdrawn after fairly widespread distribution due to serious side-effects.
The real concern would be if your bodies immune system overreacted and then started attacking your own body. Have you heard about any such reports?
No, but the immune system can do the 'wrong thing' and actually make the problem worse, eg. by producing the wrong sort of antibodies ('non-neutralising antibodies'). This is why, for example, creating a vaccine for Dengue fever is very difficult. If you have an existing dengue fever vaccine, and then encounter the actual virus, you can end up far more severely ill than if you hadn't had the vaccine, due to ADE. That's why there isn't a widespread rollout of dengue fever vaccine at this time.
Similar issues were found during animal testing in all previous attempts to make coronavirus vaccines. Perhaps they've solved that problem with these new vaccines. But I'm waiting to find out before I take one.
No. Just like some people who have been infected with COVID19 Corona virus may still be able to be reinfected. But if your immune system has already been primed, it should be more ready, and hence if you do ‘catch it’, it should be a lot milder. And your body should be able to fight it off quicker.
Agreed - but once the antibodies go away, is your body able to react to the next infection in the 'correct' way, in the same way that someone with natural immunity would?
I don’t think there is enough data to have a definite answer. But you can only transmit any significant amount of the virus if it can replicate inside your cells. If your immune system is attacking the virus because it was ready for it, the virus will have a hard time replicating quicker than the immune system is killing it.
Yes - but is it killing it in the right places in the body to affect transmission? That's what the quote from HART I mentioned above (sparking a debate about how seriously we should take HART...) was arguing.
There's an awful lot we don't know at this point. We're just doing stuff anyway, and hoping it is the right thing.
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Hmm, I was trying to avoid making possibly the longest post ever on this forum, but no-one has posted in the thread since my last long post so this is now two very long posts in one :-/ Sorry for the 'wall of text'.
I only provided a partial quote from the link that I gave upthread but here is some more with pieces highlighted in red by me.
www.medpagetoday.com
theconversation.com
