Vaccination has not stopped Covid in any of the most highly vaccinated countries in the world, such as Israel, Malta, Iceland. Many of these countries are experiencing their highest case loads ever, even with vaccination rates in the 60-80% range, a range typically considered high enough to confer herd immunity.
The bad news is the vaccines are not protective enough to prevent infection or transmission, and their effectiveness seems to fade after ~6months according to Israeli data on Pfizer. The good news is, for most people vaccination seems to reduce severity of symptoms.
However, other good news is that numerous studies demonstrate naturally acquired immunity provides superior protection (according to Israeli data, over 6.7 times as effective) and long-lasting immunological response. Serological surveys can be conducted to determine the degree of natural immunity existing in a population.
Everyone is going to get Covid eventually, it's time to look at treatments that help the body defeat Covid with minimal harm.
Nope, not even. I had COVID Delta - it was unpleasant, but it didn’t change the way a human’s immune system works. Something called antibodies I believe….
@handley, to quote one of my favorite movies Billy Madison:
"At no point in your rambling, incoherent response were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul."
Hi Erik, love your work and enjoy reading it regardless of it I agree or not. I am going to do something I never do and comment on the article you wrote.
I think if we want to handle Covid we need to be honest and open about everything. Only 9.1% of African Americans are fully vaccinated according to the CDC's website. Why is that not discussed when talking about vaccines. Is it racist to call out one race? People don't seem to have a problem calling out white Trump supporters.
You specifically call out Florida but their vaccination rate is 58% and is hardly the worst in the country and close to other states like California (65%). I think the media has a fascination with Florida because Desantis is the frontrunner to be president if Trump doesn't run again. ( I hope he doesn't.)
I got all of this from the CDC website. I am not writing this to argue or be mean but just to have a conversation. I am not from Florida so I am not defending the state because of that. I am from Maryland and I do consider myself belonging to one political party so its not Partisan BS.
Hmm, did I miss it when you wrote "fully vaccinated"? Sorry if that is the case. Where can I find these statistics? Government statistics are always awful to navigate.
"As of July 19, 2021, CDC reported that race/ethnicity was known for 58% of people who had received at least one dose of the vaccine. Among this group, nearly two thirds were White (59%), 9% were Black, 16% were Hispanic, 6% were Asian, 1% were American Indian or Alaska Native, and <1% were Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander, while 8% reported multiple or other race."
This statistic seems to say that blacks were 9% of those who had gotten at least one shot by July 19th. Later on, the article continues with by-race vaccination frequencies:
"Overall, across these 40 states, the percent of White people who have received at least one COVID-19 vaccine dose (48%) was roughly 1.3 times higher than the rate for Black people (36%) and 1.2 times higher than the rate for Hispanic people (41%) as of July 19, 2021."
So the number seems wrong but the direction is correct; African-Americans are vaccinating at lower rates. Another possibility could be that this is due to Simpson's paradox and the apparent difference disappears when you look at state-by-state statistics. I don't have time to do this kind of analysis right now, but it would rely on blacks possibly being over-represented in states where the vaccination schedules have been slower (I do not know if significant between-states differences exist in the US - in Europe we have quite large country-by-country differences).
I do not think you are racist for raising this possibility.
The graph does look to tell that the % of black people is lower but I cant find the actual % on the CDC website so the 36% mentioned above in the article could be correct.
As far as your last point I don't believe there are certain states that have been slower to administer vaccines. If a state has a lower % of vaccinated people it is because the population doesn't want to get it. We don't have a supply issue in the United State with vaccines.
This graph seems to give the appropriate number for every demographic. The % is lower than expected for all races (but this might be due to inclusion of non-adults?) but again we see that African-Americans are lagging behind others.
I'm honestly jealous about the vaccine policy, my country went along with the (awful) EU-coordinated vaccine acquisitions. First months of negotiating down the prices, then banning the AZ vaccine as well. Hilariously, the EU then sued the AZ company over vaccine supply issues even though we're not using AZ anymore. If you think about it, what is the most evil, purely malicious thing a government could do during a pandemic? I think suing the guy manufacturing the cheapest vaccines would be pretty close to the top of that list!
In the UK, we are heading towards 80% vaccination. The overly dominant variant here is Delta, yet cases day on day are falling, as are hospital admissions. People are still catching Covid, but in the vast majority of cases it is causing nothing more than the equivalent of a serious case of the flu. Our government is planning for booster shots to run alongside the autumn flu jabs. So in short, you appear to be right: mass vaccination is probably the way out.
Vaccination has not stopped Covid in any of the most highly vaccinated countries in the world, such as Israel, Malta, Iceland. Many of these countries are experiencing their highest case loads ever, even with vaccination rates in the 60-80% range, a range typically considered high enough to confer herd immunity.
The bad news is the vaccines are not protective enough to prevent infection or transmission, and their effectiveness seems to fade after ~6months according to Israeli data on Pfizer. The good news is, for most people vaccination seems to reduce severity of symptoms.
However, other good news is that numerous studies demonstrate naturally acquired immunity provides superior protection (according to Israeli data, over 6.7 times as effective) and long-lasting immunological response. Serological surveys can be conducted to determine the degree of natural immunity existing in a population.
Everyone is going to get Covid eventually, it's time to look at treatments that help the body defeat Covid with minimal harm.
Nope, not even. I had COVID Delta - it was unpleasant, but it didn’t change the way a human’s immune system works. Something called antibodies I believe….
I'm not sure what you're trying to say here, because nothing I said lines up with what you're saying.
@handley, to quote one of my favorite movies Billy Madison:
"At no point in your rambling, incoherent response were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul."
Hi Erik, love your work and enjoy reading it regardless of it I agree or not. I am going to do something I never do and comment on the article you wrote.
I think if we want to handle Covid we need to be honest and open about everything. Only 9.1% of African Americans are fully vaccinated according to the CDC's website. Why is that not discussed when talking about vaccines. Is it racist to call out one race? People don't seem to have a problem calling out white Trump supporters.
You specifically call out Florida but their vaccination rate is 58% and is hardly the worst in the country and close to other states like California (65%). I think the media has a fascination with Florida because Desantis is the frontrunner to be president if Trump doesn't run again. ( I hope he doesn't.)
I got all of this from the CDC website. I am not writing this to argue or be mean but just to have a conversation. I am not from Florida so I am not defending the state because of that. I am from Maryland and I do consider myself belonging to one political party so its not Partisan BS.
Hmm, did I miss it when you wrote "fully vaccinated"? Sorry if that is the case. Where can I find these statistics? Government statistics are always awful to navigate.
This is interesting, I had never heard about this (although I am not even American). Could it be as simple as a mis-communicated number, or is it due to a large anti-vax movement among black Americans? I tried looking for these statistics and landed on this website that cites the CDC: https://www.kff.org/coronavirus-covid-19/issue-brief/latest-data-on-covid-19-vaccinations-race-ethnicity/
I think the relevant quote would be this one:
"As of July 19, 2021, CDC reported that race/ethnicity was known for 58% of people who had received at least one dose of the vaccine. Among this group, nearly two thirds were White (59%), 9% were Black, 16% were Hispanic, 6% were Asian, 1% were American Indian or Alaska Native, and <1% were Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander, while 8% reported multiple or other race."
This statistic seems to say that blacks were 9% of those who had gotten at least one shot by July 19th. Later on, the article continues with by-race vaccination frequencies:
"Overall, across these 40 states, the percent of White people who have received at least one COVID-19 vaccine dose (48%) was roughly 1.3 times higher than the rate for Black people (36%) and 1.2 times higher than the rate for Hispanic people (41%) as of July 19, 2021."
So the number seems wrong but the direction is correct; African-Americans are vaccinating at lower rates. Another possibility could be that this is due to Simpson's paradox and the apparent difference disappears when you look at state-by-state statistics. I don't have time to do this kind of analysis right now, but it would rely on blacks possibly being over-represented in states where the vaccination schedules have been slower (I do not know if significant between-states differences exist in the US - in Europe we have quite large country-by-country differences).
I do not think you are racist for raising this possibility.
I just looked at the data again and you are correct that it is 9% of who had gotten at least one shot. https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#vaccination-demographic
The graph does look to tell that the % of black people is lower but I cant find the actual % on the CDC website so the 36% mentioned above in the article could be correct.
As far as your last point I don't believe there are certain states that have been slower to administer vaccines. If a state has a lower % of vaccinated people it is because the population doesn't want to get it. We don't have a supply issue in the United State with vaccines.
Thanks. I realized that on the sidebar you can find a "demographic trends" page: https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#vaccination-demographics-trends
This graph seems to give the appropriate number for every demographic. The % is lower than expected for all races (but this might be due to inclusion of non-adults?) but again we see that African-Americans are lagging behind others.
I'm honestly jealous about the vaccine policy, my country went along with the (awful) EU-coordinated vaccine acquisitions. First months of negotiating down the prices, then banning the AZ vaccine as well. Hilariously, the EU then sued the AZ company over vaccine supply issues even though we're not using AZ anymore. If you think about it, what is the most evil, purely malicious thing a government could do during a pandemic? I think suing the guy manufacturing the cheapest vaccines would be pretty close to the top of that list!
Thanks for the link. That is a much better page.
Yes, U.S. is very lucky regarding supply of vaccines.
P.S I just read your article about From Gamers and put an order in! Really looking forward to it! I wish Forbes had a comment section BTW.
In the UK, we are heading towards 80% vaccination. The overly dominant variant here is Delta, yet cases day on day are falling, as are hospital admissions. People are still catching Covid, but in the vast majority of cases it is causing nothing more than the equivalent of a serious case of the flu. Our government is planning for booster shots to run alongside the autumn flu jabs. So in short, you appear to be right: mass vaccination is probably the way out.