Obviously there are a lot of folks out there who strongly believe that booster shots should immediately be made available for everyone, and many will be happy about this news, but I’m personally disappointed to see that a politically appointed agency head is unilaterally overruling the recommendation of her scientific advisors that are supposed to inform these decisions. It weakens the argument that the administration is letting science lead the way in all their policies.
If you listened in to the advisory panel discussion that led up to their recommendations there was fear that recommending the booster for too broad of a population could lead to employer mandates for young, healthy, low risk people who are already well protected from their existing vaccination to be compelled to get a 3rd shot for which there is currently very little safety data, in least at the younger age groups. We already know that myocarditis is much more likely after the second dose than the first. We have no idea if the third dose is more or less risky than the second. (And both the CDC and FDA advisory panels said as much) What we do know is that the marginal benefit from a third dose for young healthy people is much smaller than the benefit from the first and second dose.
Not in healthcare, not even related, but I can confirm. Doesn’t even have much to do with the pandemic, just with realising due to the pandemic how shit my life is, in fact.
“ Anti-vaccine Facebook groups have a new message for their community members: Don’t go to the emergency room, and get your loved ones out of intensive care units.
Consumed by conspiracy theories claiming that doctors are preventing unvaccinated patients from receiving miracle cures or are even killing them on purpose, some people in anti-vaccine and pro-ivermectin Facebook groups are telling those with Covid-19 to stay away from hospitals and instead try increasingly dangerous at-home treatments, according to posts seen by NBC News over the past few weeks.”
Good luck with all those lawsuits you’ll be seeing from family members.
I refrained from posting a video of one of these in Ireland the other week. They kept on talking about how Doctor Delores Cahill, a local fascist who has finally been got rid of by her university said it was all a hoax and the ICU were killing her.
It was really distressing to see the elderly and very sick man being worked on like that. I really felt for the doctor. Dreadful that they have to put up with these people.
Obviously there are family members who don’t have control over their own bodies in families like this (children, women, the elderly if they need help getting to medical appointments), and it’s unfair to punish them for this.
But, keeping the anti-vaxxers out of the hospital does make it possible for everyone else who needs medical help to get it, and lessens the incredible pressure on medical workers in these extreme times.
Interesting tidbit near the end of that article (emphasis mine):
One challenge in developing antiviral drugs quickly has been recruiting enough participants for the clinical trials, each of which needs to enroll many hundreds of people, said Dr. Elizabeth Duke, a Fred Hutch research associate overseeing its molnupiravir trial.
Participants must be unvaccinated and enrolled in the trial within five days of a positive COVID test. Any given day, interns make 100 calls to newly COVID-positive people in the Seattle area — and most say no.
“Just generally speaking, there’s a lot of mistrust about the scientific process,” Duke said. “And some of the people are saying kind of nasty things to the interns.”
I don’t watch this show, but my aunt called to tell me that it really made an impression on her. She often forgets that vaccinated people can still be at risk (or put others at risk). Hopefully, this had the same effect on lots of other viewers who aren’t taking precautions seriously:
Hey, at this point I’m angry enough to be all for it. If I ever get injured or ill enough to require an ICU, I would much rather that there be a bed available for me.
According to the Deutsche Welle, Mr. Bolsonaro was interviewed by two members of the Querdenken, an anti-vax german movement that is being under scrutiny of the German intelligence services. He stated that the virus just shortened the lives of its victims only for mere days or weeks, as they would eventually die, because they already had serious diseases.
