Coronavirus

[dta1984]

47 minutes ago, Malacka11 said:

If you're a vaccine conspiracy theorist, then that means you either know literally nothing about how the body and cells work (which I can't blame you for) or that you have serious trust issues and an inability to determine fact from bullshit (which is 100% on you).

You should stop lumping vaccine conspiracy with covid vaccine questioners.   While there's probably alot of general anti vax crossover, many are questioning the covid vaccine specifically and for good reason (mixed messaging, rushed development, side effects, low covid mortality so why bother?).

There will always be sheep and there will always be those who question and don't follow along blindly.  Just because you choose to question shouldn't put you in the Q category, or a certain political party affiliation.

[Hoosier]

The safety data from most age groups seems pretty well-established at this point.  Your side effects are generally going to show up in hours/days, maybe in certain cases weeks later but very unlikely beyond that.

While we're on this subject, the vaccine is apparently good enough for Trump, who reportedly got vaccinated in private a couple months ago.  If we take that to be true, why do it like that?  Him taking it in front of the cameras would've been a powerful message to skeptical people.  The only reasons I can come up with are that he wishes he had a more muscular looking arm or that he likes perpetuating the divide, since a disproportionate number of the covid vaccine skeptics are from that side.

[dta1984]

1 minute ago, Hoosier said:

The safety data from most age groups seems pretty well-established at this point.  Your side effects are generally going to show up in hours/days, maybe in certain cases weeks later but very unlikely beyond that.

While we're on this subject, the vaccine is apparently good enough for Trump, who reportedly got vaccinated in private a couple months ago.  If we take that to be true, why do it like that?  Him taking it in front of the cameras would've been a powerful message to skeptical people.  The only reasons I can come up with are that he wishes he had a more muscular looking arm or that he likes perpetuating the divide, since a disproportionate number of the covid vaccine skeptics are from that side.

Does that statement not seem bizarre to you at all?   Our data is from what...8 months?  Isn't a typical vaccine trial and approval process many years?  

[OSUmetstud]

1 minute ago, dta1984 said:

Does that statement not seem bizarre to you at all?   Our data is from what...8 months?  Isn't a typical vaccine trial and approval process many years?  

Dr. Paul Offit who is like the vaccine guy discusses that in this short interview here. All the serious rare side effects that have occurred with vaccines occur within 6 weeks of receiving the vaccine. 

https://www.chop.edu/centers-programs/vaccine-education-center/video/what-are-the-long-term-side-effects-of-covid-19-vaccine

This is also not a zero-sum choice. If you don't take a vaccine, you run a significantly higher risk of complications and/or death from covid. 

[WaryWarren]

13 minutes ago, dta1984 said:

I never said scientific studies, I said there's plenty out there to question the covid vaccine safety and effectiveness.  Safety, meaning side effects, which is in the below one of many articles.  Effectiveness, meaning the unknown....can you still get covid, can you still transmit covid?   

 

https://kutv.com/news/coronavirus/covid-19-vaccine-side-effects-deaths-the-lack-of-information-on-how-where-to-report

Anecdotal evidence, gee what a surprise. There are going to be adverse reactions to any vaccine. The efficacy for the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are 95 and 94% respectively. That is pretty damn impressive, considering not much at all was known about this virus just 12 months ago. Are you willfully obtuse just for the attention? Well, you have ours now.

[fluoronium]

36 minutes ago, dta1984 said:

Does that statement not seem bizarre to you at all?   Our data is from what...8 months?  Isn't a typical vaccine trial and approval process many years?  

What I find bizarre is that people that are such skeptics about these vaccines are never skeptical about the long term effects from the virus itself. Long term lung/heart/nerve damage in covid survivors is well documented in literature. The vaccines have shown to be incredibly safe compared to covid over the same time scale.

I realize under a year of data for a new vaccine is less than ideal, but the virus would have run through everybody if we waited a couple years. It's not like the vaccines were created from scratch a year ago though. The methods used in the current authorized vaccines (mRNA, adenovirus vector) have been studied and trialed on humans for several years before this virus was ever infecting humans, including for two related coronaviruses (SARS-CoV and MERS-CoV). It's not vaccine or nothing, you are choosing between a vaccine and the virus. You'd be silly to think your chances are better off with the mystery bat virus from China over one of the authorized vaccines.

Personally, I'm thankful for every person ahead of me in line that refuses it. It only means I'll get one sooner.

[winterwx21]

38 minutes ago, fluoronium said:

What I find bizarre is that people that are such skeptics about these vaccines are never skeptical about the long term effects from the virus itself. Long term lung/heart/nerve damage in covid survivors is well documented in literature. The vaccines have shown to be incredibly safe compared to covid over the same time scale.

I realize under a year of data for a new vaccine is less than ideal, but the virus would have run through everybody if we waited a couple years. It's not like the vaccines were created from scratch a year ago though. The methods used in the current authorized vaccines (mRNA, adenovirus vector) have been studied and trialed on humans for several years before this virus was ever infecting humans, including for two related coronaviruses (SARS-CoV and MERS-CoV). It's not vaccine or nothing, you are choosing between a vaccine and the virus. You'd be silly to think your chances are better off with the mystery bat virus from China over one of the authorized vaccines.

Personally, I'm thankful for every person ahead of me in line that refuses it. It only means I'll get one sooner.

I think it really depends on your Covid risk level. The statistics are overwhelming on who is at high risk and who is at extremely low risk. An obese person with weak heart and lungs is at very high risk of having a bad outcome from Covid. Underlying conditions like high blood presseure, heart disease, diabetes, etc. Statistics show that even just being overweight increases risk.   For people in these groups, it's extremely important to be vaccinated. But an athlete that's normal body weight with no underlying health conditions and extremely strong heart and lungs? People like that are at extremely low risk of having Covid complications. In fact a large percentage of people in that category remain asymptomatic when they get Covid. So I think people in that category can avoid being vaccinated and not have to worry.

 

I do think the Covid vaccine is very important, because the majority of people are vulnerable. When you look at overweight/obese and underlying health conditions, at least 75% of people in this country are in that category and vulnerable. So we need to get the majority of people vaccinated. We need about 75% vaccinated to get herd immunity and end the pandemic, so it should work out well if most of the more vulnerable people get vaccinated. But for the people that are in the extremely low risk group, I can understand not wanting to take a chance with the very slight chance of getting the very rare severe reaction to the vaccine. If you do all the hard work (diet and exercise) to put yourself at extremely low Covid risk, it's understandable not wanting to take any risk with a vaccine (even as safe as they are with severe reactions being very rare). But for vulnerable people, getting the vaccine is critical because they're at much higher risk of having a bad Covid outcome than having a bad reaction to the vaccine.

[cutlew]

52 minutes ago, winterwx21 said:

But an athlete that's normal body weight with no underlying health conditions and extremely strong heart and lungs? People like that are at extremely low risk of having Covid complications. In fact a large percentage of people in that category remain asymptomatic when they get Covid. So I think people in that category can avoid being vaccinated and not have to worry.

Seems like this NHL player should be exhibit A against that argument.

https://www.buffalohockeybeat.com/sabres-rasmus-ristolainen-reveals-difficult-battle-with-covid-19/

Whether your chance of dying or falling severely ill is 50% or 0.5% to start with, it blows my mind that a couple hours of headache and arm soreness wouldn’t be worth reducing that chance by 95%. Or isn’t worth the additional 95% protection to your grandmother who has COPD, or your co-worker who has diabetes, or your grocery store clerk who has an immune condition.

[OSUmetstud]

12 minutes ago, cutlew said:

Seems like this NHL player should be exhibit A against that argument.

https://www.buffalohockeybeat.com/sabres-rasmus-ristolainen-reveals-difficult-battle-with-covid-19/

Whether your chance of dying or falling severely ill is 50% or 0.5% to start with, it blows my mind that a couple hours of headache and arm soreness wouldn’t be worth reducing that chance by 95%. Or isn’t worth the additional 95% protection to your grandmother who has COPD, or your co-worker who has diabetes, or your grocery store clerk who has an immune condition.

Yeah, the risks of serious vaccine complications are on the order of 1 in 1 million or less that have been observed occasionally in past vaccines. Deaths are even more rare than that, even if Rasmus's ordeal is rare for a healthy person on my awful hockey team. 

US COVID

Age Deaths 

0-17    208

18-29 1764

30-39  5198

40-49 13997

These numbers are huge relative to any risk a vaccine would impart for younger and middle-aged people. 

 

 

[winterwx21]

8 hours ago, OSUmetstud said:

Yeah, the risks of serious vaccine complications are on the order of 1 in 1 million or less that have been observed occasionally in past vaccines. Deaths are even more rare than that, even if Rasmus's ordeal is rare for a healthy person on my awful hockey team. 

US COVID

Age Deaths 

0-17    208

18-29 1764

30-39  5198

40-49 13997

These numbers are huge relative to any risk a vaccine would impart for younger and middle-aged people. 

 

 

Did you read the kutv.com article that was posted on the last page? We're seeing more severe anaphylaxis reactions with the Covid vaccines than we've seen with other vaccines from the past, and it's more than what we saw in the rushed Covid trials. Here is the quote from Dr. Tamara Sheffield...

"In terms of what is higher than we would see in other vaccines, anaphylaxis is moderately higher," Sheffield said.

And some of the stories of what happened to people are downright frightening. Look, I'm not against the Covid vaccine. As I said, I think it's extremely important for all vulnerable groups to get vaccinated. People that have any kind of underlying condition  (even very common things like high blood pressure or being overweight)  are at much higher risk of developing severe Covid, so it 100% makes sense for them to get the vaccine. I'm just saying for younger to middle aged people that have no underlying conditions at all, it's not as important to get vaccinated because they're super low risk of developing Covid complications. That hockey player is an incredibly rare case, but even he was not in the hospital fighting for his life. He's just fine now. You posted the deaths in younger age groups, but how many of those have underlying conditions? Probably most of them. The statistics show that most young Covid deaths are people with underlying conditions. I'm saying all people with underlying conditions, even the young, should get vaccinated. This vaccine is critical.

The only people that seem to have natural strong protection from this horrible virus are younger fit people with no underlying conditions. I can understand people in that group not wanting to take any chance with a vaccine like this one because they're already at such low risk. I happen to be in that group. Normal body weight with no underlying conditions and athlete level fitness due to a lot of exercise. But I also happen to have very bad allergies. I'm allergic to tons of things, including some food allergies. So since I'm at such low Covid risk (in fact I had Covid last Spring and had hardly any symptoms at all) I would be terribly worried about getting a reaction to the vaccine since I have so many allergies and we're hearing that this vaccine is causing more anaphylaxis reactions than other types of vaccines from the past. So I don't feel it's worth the risk for me since I'm already at such low Covid risk. I'm sure you can understand that.

[winterwx21]

8 hours ago, cutlew said:

Seems like this NHL player should be exhibit A against that argument.

https://www.buffalohockeybeat.com/sabres-rasmus-ristolainen-reveals-difficult-battle-with-covid-19/

Whether your chance of dying or falling severely ill is 50% or 0.5% to start with, it blows my mind that a couple hours of headache and arm soreness wouldn’t be worth reducing that chance by 95%. Or isn’t worth the additional 95% protection to your grandmother who has COPD, or your co-worker who has diabetes, or your grocery store clerk who has an immune condition.

But I'm saying the grandmother with COPD and co-worker with diabetes and grocery clerk with the immune condition SHOULD get vaccinated. They should be fully protected so it wouldn't matter being around someone who isn't vaccinated. These vaccines offer 100% protection against severe illness. People in those vulnerable groups are eligible for the vaccine right now, while younger people with no underlying conditions are not eligible. If those vulnerable people are not signing up to get the vaccine right now, they're being very foolish.

[Hoosier]

1 hour ago, winterwx21 said:

But I'm saying the grandmother with COPD and co-worker with diabetes and grocery clerk with the immune condition SHOULD get vaccinated. They should be fully protected so it wouldn't matter being around someone who isn't vaccinated. These vaccines offer 100% protection against severe illness. People in those vulnerable groups are eligible for the vaccine right now, while younger people with no underlying conditions are not eligible. If those vulnerable people are not signing up to get the vaccine right now, they're being very foolish.

Not exactly true.  In the trials, the vaccines are near 100% in preventing hospitalizations/deaths, but there have been some "severe" covid cases in those vaccinated people.  Of course I would think a severe covid case would require some hospital time, so I'm not sure how they are classifying that.

I totally get not wanting to get a vaccine back in December/January, since rare side effects can slip by in the trials (which we saw to some extent with the anaphylaxis reactions that didn't really show up in trials) but I think the fear of the "unknowns" about the vaccines becomes a harder position to stand by with the passage of time.  That being said, I do think it should still be a personal choice to get one, with a strong public education campaign to try to get as many as possible to take it.

[mattb65]

1 hour ago, winterwx21 said:

Did you read the kutv.com article that was posted on the last page? We're seeing more severe anaphylaxis reactions with the Covid vaccines than we've seen with other vaccines from the past, and it's more than what we saw in the rushed Covid trials. Here is the quote from Dr. Tamara Sheffield...

"In terms of what is higher than we would see in other vaccines, anaphylaxis is moderately higher," Sheffield said.

And some of the stories of what happened to people are downright frightening. Look, I'm not against the Covid vaccine. As I said, I think it's extremely important for all vulnerable groups to get vaccinated. People that have any kind of underlying condition  (even very common things like high blood pressure or being overweight)  are at much higher risk of developing severe Covid, so it 100% makes sense for them to get the vaccine. I'm just saying for younger to middle aged people that have no underlying conditions at all, it's not as important to get vaccinated because they're super low risk of developing Covid complications. That hockey player is an incredibly rare case, but even he was not in the hospital fighting for his life. He's just fine now. You posted the deaths in younger age groups, but how many of those have underlying conditions? Probably most of them. The statistics show that most young Covid deaths are people with underlying conditions. I'm saying all people with underlying conditions, even the young, should get vaccinated. This vaccine is critical.

The only people that seem to have natural strong protection from this horrible virus are younger fit people with no underlying conditions. I can understand people in that group not wanting to take any chance with a vaccine like this one because they're already at such low risk. I happen to be in that group. Normal body weight with no underlying conditions and athlete level fitness due to a lot of exercise. But I also happen to have very bad allergies. I'm allergic to tons of things, including some food allergies. So since I'm at such low Covid risk (in fact I had Covid last Spring and had hardly any symptoms at all) I would be terribly worried about getting a reaction to the vaccine since I have so many allergies and we're hearing that this vaccine is causing more anaphylaxis reactions than other types of vaccines from the past. So I don't feel it's worth the risk for me since I'm already at such low Covid risk. I'm sure you can understand that.

TL;DR: If you do the math for young healthy people - covid vaccine - essentially eliminates all risk of infection or death from the infection and introduces a 1 in 200,000 to 1 in 500,000 risk of a treatable anaphylactic reaction. Covid infection has a ~0.5 to 2% hospitalization rate for people 18-39, and of those who get hospitalized with no underlying conditions 1-2% die and ~6-8% require mechanical ventilation. There's a subset of young healthy people that suffer months of chronic debilitating symptoms - as a Neurologist, I've treated a handful of these. I have no idea the rate of this syndrome but it can be significantly debilitating. This syndrome to my knowledge has not been described in those vaccinated. Proportionally speaking, despite what the anecdotes say, there is no question that the risks from the covid infection to the young and healthy are orders of magnitude higher than the risk of anaphylaxis or other serious negative effects from the vaccine. The benefits of receiving the vaccine, preventing serious illness or infection far outweigh the miniscule risks of an anaphylactic reaction that is usually easily treatable.

See below for detailed discussion and sources

 

I apologize that this is a ridiculously long post but I've did the research on this when I made my own decision to choose whether to receive the vaccine and felt it would be worthwhile to share. I am 37 and am fit enough to easily run a 5k and have no underlying health conditions. This analysis also doesn't even consider the public health benefits of a young/healthy person getting vaccinated and thus much much less likely to continue a chain of infection transmission or serve as a super spreader.

 

I read the article, it's a terrible adverse reaction that the individual suffered. I could find many anecdotes of young healthy people who contracted covid and had as bad or much worse experiences than the anecdotes about the negative vaccine effects. I could also find thousands of anecdotes from people that had mild covid and thousands of anecdotes from people that had little to no negative effects from the vaccine.

As a medical provider using anecdotes to give medical device is a fools errand. As an individual (not as a provider) using anecdotes to make an individual decision on what health decision to make is normal and common. If your friend got the vaccine and ended up in the hospital you are going to be afraid and probably not trust the experts saying this vaccine is extremely safe and effective. Similarly where you consume information and what your pre-existing biases are will inform which stories your read and absorb and which stories you ignore or discount.

This is why double blind placebo controlled trials are so incredibly powerful. I want to disavow people of the notion that the Moderna, Pfizer or J&J phase 3 trials were rushed in any way. They were done with the rigor of all the best clinical trial studies we use to make medical recommendations for other illnesses. The regulatory process was expedited - in normal circumstances phase 1 and 2 take longer, the FDA review process takes longer. All of the red tape was done away with - phase 1/2 were done in paralell, phase 3 was started immediately after phase 1/2 were successful. Even though the vaccine was highly effective they still said wait lets monitor for at least 3 months and as OSUMetstud said above the negative effects tend to happen in the first 6 weeks. Furthermore we now have real world data from hundreds of millions of doses worldwide that is largely consistent with the clinical trial findings.

Looking specifically at the relative risk for people as you describe - normal body weight, young, no underlying conditions and otherwise healthy. The FDA reviewed the clinical trial data and gave EUA for this group because the benefits of vaccine far outweigh the risks.

Covid vaccine - no deaths in the clinical trials, all the deaths that occur in close relationship to the vaccine have been investigated and none have been found to be caused by the vaccine

Source - CDC - https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/safety/adverse-events.html

Quote

Over 76 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines were administered in the United States from December 14, 2020, through March 1, 2021. During this time, VAERS received 1,381 reports of death (0.0018%) among people who received a COVID-19 vaccine. CDC and FDA physicians review each case report of death as soon as notified and CDC requests medical records to further assess reports. A review of available clinical information including death certificates, autopsy, and medical records revealed no evidence that vaccination contributed to patient deaths. CDC and FDA will continue to investigate reports of adverse events, including deaths, reported to VAERS.

The vaccine trial shows the well published 94/95% reduction in symptomatic cases for the RNA vaccines but there was also nearly 100% reduction in severe illness and there was a 100% reduction in hospitalization rate for the virus

In terms of the risk for anaphylaxis that his been discussed in this thread and likely was the cause of the anecdotal story from the article. 2 to 5 per million (baseline vaccination rate is 1 per million) - so relatively higher but still very rare. Of those that get anaphylaxis usually it is treated with a dose of epinephrine with no further negative reactions and usually a brief admission to the hospital for observation. of the 2 to 5 per million a much smaller number will have a more serious anaphylactic reaction that leads to cardiac arrest or require more invasive treatments.

Quote

Anaphylaxis after COVID-19 vaccination is rare. If this occurs, vaccination providers can effectively and immediately treat the reaction.

CDC and FDA scientists have evaluated reports from people who experienced a type of severe allergic reaction—anaphylaxis—after getting a COVID-19 vaccine. Anaphylaxis after COVID-19 vaccination is rare and occurred in approximately 2 to 5 people per million vaccinated in the United States based on events reported to VAERS. This kind of allergic reaction almost always occurs within 30 minutes after vaccination. Fortunately, vaccination providers have medicines available to effectively and immediately treat patients who experience anaphylaxis following vaccination. 

Source CDC - https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/safety/adverse-events.html

Hopefully that adds some proportionality on the relative risks from the covid vaccine.

How about the risks for the covid infection to the otherwise young and healthy? The data is hard to find the death rate for this cohort.

This study which clearly shows the harms of obesity/hypertension in covid is also informative as the control group is people without those conditions. https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/fullarticle/2770542 

From that article - over 5% of hospitalized young adults with no risk factors require mechanical ventilation and 1-2% died.

I'm familiar with the age based data in Hawaii in terms of risk of hospitalization/death from the infection 2% of 18-29 year old positive cases required hospitalization and 5% of 30-39 year old cases required hospitalization. If I assume that there are also 50% of asymptomatic cases never identified then those numbers would go down to 1% and 2.5% respectively. In those groups there were 5 deaths in the 18-29 and the 30-39 group. I don't have data on the rate of underlying conditions but the JAMA article above is a useful reference looking at this question on all hospitalized young adults. Hawaii is a good example because we've never had any major hospitalization or testing shortages except for testing shortages in the very beginning of the pandemic https://health.hawaii.gov/coronavirusdisease2019/what-you-should-know/current-situation-in-hawaii/

 

[mattb65]

46 minutes ago, Hoosier said:

Not exactly true.  In the trials, the vaccines are near 100% in preventing hospitalizations/deaths, but there have been some "severe" covid cases in those vaccinated people.  Of course I would think a severe covid case would require some hospital time, so I'm not sure how they are classifying that.

I totally get not wanting to get a vaccine back in December/January, since rare side effects can slip by in the trials (which we saw to some extent with the anaphylaxis reactions that didn't really show up in trials) but I think the fear of the "unknowns" about the vaccines becomes a harder position to stand by with the passage of time.  That being said, I do think it should still be a personal choice to get one, with a strong public education campaign to try to get as many as possible to take it.

Here you go "severe" covid in the pfizer trial - not hospitalized, did not require any treatment, only classified as a severe illness based on oxygen saturation.

Quote

The vaccine recipient who had severe COVID-19 disease met the severe case definition because oxygen saturation at the COVID-19 illness visit was 93% on room air. The subject was not hospitalized, did not seek further medical care, and did not have risk factors for severe disease. The three placebo recipients who had severe COVID-19 disease met the severe case definition for the following reasons: one subject had an oxygen saturation of 92% on room air without other severe disease criteria, one subject was hospitalized for noninvasive positive pressure ventilation with bilateral pneumonia, and one subject had an oxygen saturation of 92% and ICU admission for heart block. One of these placebo recipients with severe disease also had a body mass index > 30 kg/m2 as a risk factor, while the other two participants did not have any risk factors for severe disease.

Emphasis mine

Source - https://www.fda.gov/media/144245/download

[winterwx21]

4 minutes ago, mattb65 said:

TL;DR: If you do the math for young healthy people - covid vaccine - essentially eliminates all risk of infection or death from the infection and introduces a 1 in 200,000 to 1 in 500,000 risk of a treatable anaphylactic reaction. Covid infection has a ~0.5 to 2% hospitalization rate for people 18-39, and of those who get hospitalized with no underlying conditions 1-2% die and ~6-8% require mechanical ventilation. There's a subset of young healthy people that suffer months of chronic debilitating symptoms - as a Neurologist, I've treated a handful of these. I have no idea the rate of this syndrome but it can be significantly debilitating. This syndrome to my knowledge has not been described in those vaccinated. Proportionally speaking, despite what the anecdotes say, there is no question that the risks from the covid infection to the young and healthy are orders of magnitude higher than the risk of anaphylaxis or other serious negative effects from the vaccine. The benefits of receiving the vaccine, preventing serious illness or infection far outweigh the miniscule risks of an anaphylactic reaction that is usually easily treatable.

See below for detailed discussion and sources

 

I apologize that this is a ridiculously long post but I've did the research on this when I made my own decision to choose whether to receive the vaccine and felt it would be worthwhile to share. I am 37 and am fit enough to easily run a 5k and have no underlying health conditions. This analysis also doesn't even consider the public health benefits of a young/healthy person getting vaccinated and thus much much less likely to continue a chain of infection transmission or serve as a super spreader.

 

I read the article, it's a terrible adverse reaction that the individual suffered. I could find many anecdotes of young healthy people who contracted covid and had as bad or much worse experiences than the anecdotes about the negative vaccine effects. I could also find thousands of anecdotes from people that had mild covid and thousands of anecdotes from people that had little to no negative effects from the vaccine.

As a medical provider using anecdotes to give medical device is a fools errand. As an individual (not as a provider) using anecdotes to make an individual decision on what health decision to make is normal and common. If your friend got the vaccine and ended up in the hospital you are going to be afraid and probably not trust the experts saying this vaccine is extremely safe and effective. Similarly where you consume information and what your pre-existing biases are will inform which stories your read and absorb and which stories you ignore or discount.

This is why double blind placebo controlled trials are so incredibly powerful. I want to disavow people of the notion that the Moderna, Pfizer or J&J phase 3 trials were rushed in any way. They were done with the rigor of all the best clinical trial studies we use to make medical recommendations for other illnesses. The regulatory process was expedited - in normal circumstances phase 1 and 2 take longer, the FDA review process takes longer. All of the red tape was done away with - phase 1/2 were done in paralell, phase 3 was started immediately after phase 1/2 were successful. Even though the vaccine was highly effective they still said wait lets monitor for at least 3 months and as OSUMetstud said above the negative effects tend to happen in the first 6 weeks. Furthermore we now have real world data from hundreds of millions of doses worldwide that is largely consistent with the clinical trial findings.

Looking specifically at the relative risk for people as you describe - normal body weight, young, no underlying conditions and otherwise healthy. The FDA reviewed the clinical trial data and gave EUA for this group because the benefits of vaccine far outweigh the risks.

Covid vaccine - no deaths in the clinical trials, all the deaths that occur in close relationship to the vaccine have been investigated and none have been found to be caused by the vaccine

Source - CDC - https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/safety/adverse-events.html

The vaccine trial shows the well published 94/95% reduction in symptomatic cases for the RNA vaccines but there was also nearly 100% reduction in severe illness and there was a 100% reduction in hospitalization rate for the virus

In terms of the risk for anaphylaxis that his been discussed in this thread and likely was the cause of the anecdotal story from the article. 2 to 5 per million (baseline vaccination rate is 1 per million) - so relatively higher but still very rare. Of those that get anaphylaxis usually it is treated with a dose of epinephrine with no further negative reactions and usually a brief admission to the hospital for observation. of the 2 to 5 per million a much smaller number will have a more serious anaphylactic reaction that leads to cardiac arrest or require more invasive treatments.

Source CDC - https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/safety/adverse-events.html

Hopefully that adds some proportionality on the relative risks from the covid vaccine.

How about the risks for the covid infection to the otherwise young and healthy? The data is hard to find the death rate for this cohort.

This study which clearly shows the harms of obesity/hypertension in covid is also informative as the control group is people without those conditions. https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/fullarticle/2770542 

From that article - over 5% of hospitalized young adults with no risk factors require mechanical ventilation and 1-2% died.

I'm familiar with the age based data in Hawaii in terms of risk of hospitalization/death from the infection 2% of 18-29 year old positive cases required hospitalization and 5% of 30-39 year old cases required hospitalization. If I assume that there are also 50% of asymptomatic cases never identified then those numbers would go down to 1% and 2.5% respectively. In those groups there were 5 deaths in the 18-29 and the 30-39 group. I don't have data on the rate of underlying conditions but the JAMA article above is a useful reference looking at this question on all hospitalized young adults. Hawaii is a good example because we've never had any major hospitalization or testing shortages except for testing shortages in the very beginning of the pandemic https://health.hawaii.gov/coronavirusdisease2019/what-you-should-know/current-situation-in-hawaii/

 

But what about healthy young people that get themselves into athlete level shape from exercise? There have been thousands of positive test results in college and pro sports, and you almost never hear of an athlete in the hospital with their life on the line. It seems if you get yourself into great shape (super strong heart, lungs and immune system from intense exercise), the chance of developing severe Covid is pretty much zero. There are a lot of people that are young with no underlying conditions, but are not fit because they don't exercise. I can see how they can be at slightly higher risk, because this virus can take advantage of any weakness. But if you get into tremendous shape, there's very little chance the virus can do anything serious to you. I was talking with my cardiologist about this, and this is exactly what he said. So since I have gotten myself into althlete level shape and am at close to 0% severe Covid risk but also have lots of allergies, I don't feel it's worth it taking the chance with a vaccine that's having some severe allergic reactions.

[mattb65]

39 minutes ago, winterwx21 said:

But what about healthy young people that get themselves into athlete level shape from exercise? There have been thousands of positive test results in college and pro sports, and you almost never hear of an athlete in the hospital with their life on the line. It seems if you get yourself into great shape (super strong heart, lungs and immune system from intense exercise), the chance of developing severe Covid is pretty much zero. There are a lot of people that are young with no underlying conditions, but are not fit because they don't exercise. I can see how they can be at slightly higher risk, because this virus can take advantage of any weakness. But if you get into tremendous shape, there's very little chance the virus can do anything serious to you. I was talking with my cardiologist about this, and this is exactly what he said. So since I have gotten myself into althlete level shape and am at close to 0% severe Covid risk but also have lots of allergies, I don't feel it's worth it taking the chance with a vaccine that's having some severe allergic reactions.

It's not almost zero, read the post above it's about 1 in 10,000 or higher if you do the math.  

Edit:

1 in 200k to 1 in 500k get anaphylaxis. Anaphylaxis is easily treated.  

You're twisting yourself into a logical pretzel to justify the decision you've already made.  That's okay. But it's not rationale or based on the facts. 

Also why are you seeing a cardiologist of you are athlete level healthy?

[winterwx21]

16 minutes ago, mattb65 said:

It's not almost zero, read the post above it's about 1 in 10,000 or higher if you do the math.  

Edit:

1 in 200k to 1 in 500k get anaphylaxis. Anaphylaxis is easily treated.  

You're twisting yourself into a logical pretzel to justify the decision you've already made.  That's okay. But it's not rationale or based on the facts. 

I don't see anything above about ATHLETES. There's a difference between healthy young people, and people that are actually athlete level. You can be healthy and young, but not an athlete. Getting yourself to athlete level reduces risk a lot more. I had Covid last spring and had very mild symptoms. Just a scratchy throat, a slight headache and a little congestion for a few days. I talked with my cardiologist, and he said the virus has no chance of threatening my life because I have elite althlete heart and lungs. I'll trust that my cardiologist knows what he's talking about. But again, I'm not against the vaccine at all. I realize that most people don't do the exercise to put themselves in the super low risk group, so I encourage most people to get vaccinated. I helped my parents get vaccinated. I was on the computer constantly to get them appointments, and I drove my mother down to Atlantic City Convention Center to get her vaccinated.

[OSUmetstud]

Lol. 

[mattb65]

Fine anecdote time again,  if Tatum had been vaccinated the Celtics probably wouldn't be at risk of missing the playoffs. 

https://www.si.com/nba/raptors/news/toronto-raptors-covid19-jayson-tatum-return-to-normal

Like I said you've made up your mind, we agree young and healthy athletes have an extremely low but non zero risk of severe covid.

 

I've provided the best evidence out there that also shows that the individual benefits of vaccination to eliminate this risk far outweigh the risks associated with vaccination.

There's also large societal benefit to getting young healthy people vaccinated because they tend to be drivers in asymptomatic transmission because they rationally are willing to accept more risk of exposure. 

[winterwx21]

Just now, mattb65 said:

Fine anecdote time again,  if Tatum had been vaccinated the Celtics probably wouldn't be at risk of missing the playoffs. 

https://www.si.com/nba/raptors/news/toronto-raptors-covid19-jayson-tatum-return-to-normal

Like I said you've made up your mind, we agree young and healthy athletes have an extremely low but non zero risk of severe covid.

 

I've provided the best evidence out there that also shows that the individual benefits of vaccination to eliminate this risk far outweigh the risks associated with infection. 

There's also large societal benefit to getting young healthy people vaccinated because they tend to be drivers in asymptomatic transmission because they rationally are willing to accept more risk of exposure. 

And you post a lot of great information. We all appreciate it. Obviously a lot of debates here as many disagree about different things about this virus, but obviously we all want this pandemic to end very soon. Getting most people vaccinated should do that. Hopefully this horrific pandemic will be over by the Summer. In the meantime, masking up continues to be extremely important. Hopefully everyone will continue to do that until the pandemic is over.

[purduewx80]

Got my 2nd dose of Moderna yesterday. No adverse effects today other than a minor headache when I woke up, which may or may not have been due to the glass of red wine I had last night after work. Several of my co-workers had to get their 2nd yesterday too and did not fare as well, so I’m filling in today. Seems prior infection did reduce the side effects of the 2nd, for me anyway. 
Can’t speak for the other mass vax sites, but the Kane Co one was exceptionally well run and efficient. There is no shortage of medical workers there monitoring people for anaphylaxis or other reactions -  no reason whatsoever to feel unsafe. 

[mattb65]

1 hour ago, winterwx21 said:

And you post a lot of great information. We all appreciate it. Obviously a lot of debates here as many disagree about different things about this virus, but obviously we all want this pandemic to end very soon. Getting most people vaccinated should do that. Hopefully this horrific pandemic will be over by the Summer. In the meantime, masking up continues to be extremely important. Hopefully everyone will continue to do that until the pandemic is over.

I appreciate the debate and understand the differences in opinion and hope continued discussion of the nuances in the data and how it applies to different individuals will help people see that recieving the vaccine is the correct choice.

I also read that Pfizer is planning to submit for full FDA approval,  not just EUA in April.  I'm not sure how long that approval process takes but I actually think full FDA approval would further erode a lot of lingering skepticism in the wait and see crowd. 

There will always be a small subset of individuals who are too deep in conspiracy theories to reach.  Full FDA approval would mean that there are more vaccine mandates - ie military will probably make it mandatory,  same with colleges.

[BuffaloWeather]

Does anyone know how long the antibodies last with the vaccine? I know natural infection antibodies last anywhere from a few months to a year. We likely will all be getting a booster sometime next year with the variants included?

[StormfanaticInd]

Looking better and better 

[StormfanaticInd]

15 minutes ago, BuffaloWeather said:

Does anyone know how long the antibodies last with the vaccine? I know natural infection antibodies last anywhere from a few months to a year. We likely will all be getting a booster sometime next year with the variants included?

Probably will have to get a yearly shot like the flu shot 

[Hoosier]

IHME updated with a relatively optimistic projection of 576k deaths by July 1.  Considering where we are now, it would take a sharper drop in deaths than what we've been seeing to not exceed that total.  Probably going to average over 1000 deaths per day for another few weeks, then hopefully dropping below that.  And I think it won't be until a couple weeks after hospitalizations drop below 25k that we'll get average daily deaths down to around 500, so still a ways off for that.

[StormfanaticInd]

1 hour ago, Hoosier said:

IHME updated with a relatively optimistic projection of 576k deaths by July 1.  Considering where we are now, it would take a sharper drop in deaths than what we've been seeing to not exceed that total.  Probably going to average over 1000 deaths per day for another few weeks, then hopefully dropping below that.  And I think it won't be until a couple weeks after hospitalizations drop below 25k that we'll get average daily deaths down to around 500, so still a ways off for that.

We could hit 25k hospitalizations by the last week of this month 

[WeatherMonger]

Got my first dose of Pfizer yesterday, go back April 2nd for the second. Sore where the needle went in but no issues, hopefully the same way on 2nd shot.

 

 

[Hoosier]

1 hour ago, Angrysummons said:

Deaths are going to drop sharply by the end of the month. The only reason they aren't lower now is because of backlogging(which shows the immense spread last fall/winter).

Not discounting a sharp drop... I just don't think it will be enough to hit the IHME scenario.  We are in a cruel math game where you can take the number of hospitalizations and multiply by a certain percentage (or range of percentage) and come up with approximate deaths per day.  Perhaps the formula won't work as well going forward as the 65+ age cohort may start to account for a lower proportion of the hospitalization numbers compared to the past year (if you assume a higher percentage of that age group will take the vaccine compared to younger people).  My guess is we are looking at 600k by the end of June, but would be happy to be wrong.

[StormfanaticInd]

Average daily deaths now below 2k and dropping fast