Right.

Did they not?

I mean, I'm pretty sure that before we had vaccines, we had much higher hospitalization and mortality rates, and now we have partial vaccine coverage, things are quite a lot better.

Is it your position that vaccines shouldn't have been offered?

The pre-media-mangled epidemiology messaging early was never COVID zero, it was flatten curve and slow the spread, while messaging on vax was never bulletproof but reduction in personal outcome risk and lower prevalence.

Politicized media and partisan pundits (both pro and online commenters) reduced nuance of vax research showing both R and outcomes effects to ‘it doesn’t work’ or ‘it makes you impervious’, both of which resulted in people ignoring other simple measures either from lack of faith or too much faith.

From there, inevitable discussions like these threads.