Comment by trts | Hacker News Reader

Comment by trts | Hacker News Reader

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From the speech itself, "only 1 in every 160,000 fully vaccinated Americans has been hospitalized due to covid"

According to the most recent data from the CDC (https://gis.cdc.gov/grasp/COVIDNet/COVID19_3.html), 960 out of every 160,000 Americans has been hospitalized due to covid (this is across all people regardless of vaccination status).

So there is _at least_ a 99% reduction in the rate of hospitalizations for the fully vaccinated, according to the figures he cited.

The message he's sending is that even if you are vaccinated, _you're not safe_. Why is this an effective message for persuading those who might still be convinced?

Is the overall outcome better than if our political leadership continued to transparently emphasize vaccine safety and outcomes, rather than scoring points with their political base? You convince more people to become vaccinated by being convincing. When you get more people vaccinated, you save more lives.

If someone's position is, that it doesn't matter if the overall outcome is worse, because the bad outcomes are more concentrated in selfish/stupid/red-state people, then I simply disagree with that.

Your way at arriving at 99% is quite dubious, as it assumes that from the beginning of the pandemic an equal number of Americans are vaccinated and unvaccinated, and that they are equally exposed to the virus, and that they are in equal risk groups, none of which is true.

From what I have read the those who are vaccinated are about 17 times less likely to be hospitalized. Here is a link to an example article showing that statistic:

https://www.sciencenews.org/article/covid-coronavirus-vaccin...

There is very worrisome data coming out of Israel that shows that the risk of breakthrough infections is likely to rise, as delta becomes more predominant and the efficacy of the vaccines wane.

https://www.science.org/news/2021/08/grim-warning-israel-vac...

Simply put, I don't think the assertion that the unvaccinated are killing the vaccinated is untrue. There is a lot of data that shows that being unvaccinated greatly increases your chance of spreading the virus. The virus is a much bigger part of our lives due to the unvaccinated.

Data is increasingly showing that being vaccinated is not a guarantee that you won't wind up in the hospital, have long term symptoms, or die from the virus, especially if you are in an at risk group.

17x according to the data you linked above is 94% reduction and growing, following vaccinated and unvaccinated people separately since January 2021.

> There is very worrisome data coming out of Israel that shows that the risk of breakthrough infections is likely to rise, as delta becomes more predominant and the efficacy of the vaccines wane.

There has been very worrisome data every week since this pandemic began. The best data we have is that vaccines are safe and effective, and they're important as part of our collective efforts to minimize harm.

To me, that's the harm done by the coronavirus, not the harm caused by the unvaccinated to the vaccinated.

> Data is increasingly showing that being vaccinated is not a guarantee that you won't wind up in the hospital, have long term symptoms, or die from the virus, especially if you are in an at risk group.

I've heard this same thing from the people I know who don't want to get vaccinated. Doesn't change my mind that a) the best data we have suggests it will decrease their overall risk factor and b) calling people stupid and evil or policing what they listen to isn't a good way to win that argument.

Just to be clear, I am not vaccine hesitant, or whatever they want to be called, in the slightest.

94% and growing is not true, it is quite the opposite that the data is showing that vaccine efficacy is growing. Lots of good data shows that the efficacy of the vaccine is lower with delta and as we get further from when the vaccine was administered the efficacy drops significantly. This is the reason we need boosters, but their effectiveness will also wane over time.

Even if the vaccine were 99% effective, if 5,000 vaccinated people were to die from Covid every year, the data suggests that the vast majority of them (if not all) are a result of those who are choosing not to be vaccinated. So it is not a stretch at all to say that the unvaccinated are killing the vaccinated.

I don't think that overstating the positive effect of the vaccine is a good strategy. Yes they are effective, yes everyone who can should get one, but that doesn't mean that the unvaccinated are't responsible when someone who is vaccinated gets sick.

Pointing out that the unvaccinated are responsible for getting the vaccinated sick, in addition to all of the strains they are putting on our society (economy, public health, etc), is a good argument in favor of mandates. I for one am glad Biden and other leaders pushing mandates are making this argument.

The vaccinated aren't dying from COVID, they are dying from other things because they can't get an ICU bed. ICUs are full of unvaccinated COVID patients, which means all the people getting all the other normal sicknesses are being locked out of medical care.

That's what they mean by "the unvaccinated are killing the vaccinated". People who could have lived if they got ICU care are dying because the ICUs are already full.

My friend's father got pancreatic cancer. His chemotherapy was delayed because the hospital was full of covid patients. Now he's dead. People who get mad about being harangued to take the vaccine are failing to see the whole picture.

Your comparing the rate of hospitalization of one group for the entire pandemic then comparing the rate of the second for a few months. That's not going to give you any useful data for comparison.

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