And just like that, the CDC is "wrong" now in the eyes of some folks...

[loveofourlord]

As of May 10, 115 M were vaccinated, of which 1359 were hospitalized or died. This report doesn't show people who weren't hospitalized, probably because it's hard to collect data on them. Even the numbers here are just those reported to the CDC. Since hospitals have to report routinely, they are likely more complete than the more general number of cases from people who have been vaccinated.

It's hard to know what to compare that 1359 to. You can't compare it to the total number of hospitalized and dead throughout the pandemic.

uhhh like said, you can compare it to those that are actually dying each day from covid. And is that total died from all causes or vaccinations I remember it being much lower.

 

[ThatRobGuy]

By including "chances" and "mostly" here, I think you undermine your entire argument. You've concluded that it is a risk you're willing to take. But that's an opinion, and others might find that, given case load numbers, taking that risk is premature.

Actually, it's not all that risky...

The latest data out there, even among documented breakthrough cases, is that when a vaccinated person does contract the virus, it's very mild or asymptomatic in almost all cases, and the chance of spreading is even much lower too if you are a "breakthrough case", as there have already been some studies that have concluded that in people who do test positive (12 days or more after the final dose), the viral load present is greatly reduced.

According to the CDC:
Data from Israel suggest that people vaccinated with Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine who develop COVID-19 have a four-fold lower viral load than unvaccinated people.29 This observation may indicate reduced transmissibility, as viral load has been identified as a key driver of transmission.30

When you extrapolate the data for how many breakthrough cases end in death
223 people out of 115 million that are fully vaccinated.

When you extrapolate that out to the fully population size, if you're fully vaccinated (even if you contracted COVID-19) the chances hospitalization and death are lower than that of the yearly numbers for food poisoning.

Me, being fully vaccinated, and interacting with people who are both vaccinated and unvaccinated, indoors or outdoors, is less risk of me being hospitalized or dying than the Chipotle burrito bowl I had for lunch.

 

[ThatRobGuy]

Where I live only 28% have gotten both shots.

As long as you're fully vaccinated, your chances of catching, being hospitalized for, or dying from Covid-19 are less than what your chances are of being in, hospitalized by, or dying from a car crash...regardless of what other people do.

And driving a car is a risk almost all of us take every day of our lives.

 

[ThatRobGuy]

It will also mean, however, fewer mutation opportunities for flu viruses, so that problem becomes much smaller.

Flu viruses mutate every year, but the mutations themselves are less concerning to the scientists than knowing (or not knowing) which particular strains are going to be prevalent.

Selecting Viruses for the Seasonal Flu Vaccine

Adjusting for mutations is the "easy part" for them, it's accurately determining which flu viruses will be the ones circulating that's key to having an effective seasonal vaccine.

 

[RDKirk]

Flu viruses mutate every year, but the mutations themselves are less concerning to the scientists than knowing (or not knowing) which particular strains are going to be prevalent.

Selecting Viruses for the Seasonal Flu Vaccine

Adjusting for mutations is the "easy part" for them, it's accurately determining which flu viruses will be the ones circulating that's key to having an effective seasonal vaccine.

It's not as though the have no cases to work with. Fewer mutations, fewer chances of a miss.

 

[KCfromNC]

Actually, it's not all that risky...

And that's a perfectly fine opinion to have. Alternatively, some might think that an extra few weeks of wearing a mask is no big deal to see how things go.

 

[KCfromNC]

As long as you're fully vaccinated, your chances of catching, being hospitalized for, or dying from Covid-19 are less than what your chances are of being in, hospitalized by, or dying from a car crash

And as unlikely as either are people still wear seatbelts and/or masks. Not sure of the point here.

 

[ThatRobGuy]

And as unlikely as either are people still wear seatbelts and/or masks. Not sure of the point here.

People wear seatbelts because that is the chief mitigation strategy for surviving a car crash. Masks and distancing were just the stop-gap mitigation measure used until we got vaccines available.

If some new invention came along that was a protection measure for car crashes that A) reduced a chance of a crash of even happening in the first place by over 90%, and B) reduced your chances of being injured or killed by even more than a seatbelt would in the rare instances that a crash would occur, many people would stop using seatbelts as well.

What level of protection needs to exist for something before still clinging to weaker mitigation measures in addition to that is viewed as "paranoia" or "for show" rather than pragmatism?

If someone got steel reinforced doors on their house, and a state-of-the-art security system installed with 24/7 monitoring, and still insisted on doing this every night to their doors:

Or if a person got a car that had the latest and greatest anti-theft technology on their car, and still insisted on using one of these

...we may say that person is a tad paranoid.

 

[rjs330]

And that's a perfectly fine opinion to have. Alternatively, some might think that an extra few weeks of wearing a mask is no big deal to see how things go.

Which is just fine for them. Me, I'm going maskless

 

[wing2000]

The aspect I would resent, is if they're doing that to push a narrative that the situation is still just as dangerous as it was 8 months ago, "and that's why we still need things locked down, and still need things like indefinite unemployment, and more rounds of stimulus".

Give people some time to adjust. The CDC announcement is barely a week old. As more people become fully vaccinated confidence will grow and people will resume their normal routines, including taking jobs that require a high amount of interaction with the public.

 

[ThatRobGuy]

Give people some time to adjust. The CDC announcement is barely a week old. As more people become fully vaccinated confidence will grow and people will resume their normal routines, including taking jobs that require a high amount of interaction with the public.

I had thought about that aspect, but then remembered how quickly many were willing to adopt the policy of putting them on.

The moment the CDC issued the guidance to start wearing them last year, there were people hitting the stores to buy them all up and start ordering them online, under the premise of trusting what the scientists say.

Now when the scientists say that it's okay for vaccinated people to remove them, many are being skeptical.

At the risk of sounding cynical, I think part of the quick adoption of masks by some, was specifically because of Trump saying he wasn't planning on wearing one
Trump says he won't wear face mask

CDC issued guidance for everyone to start voluntarily wearing masks on April 3rd 2020, a day later, Trump said he wasn't going to wear one, within a week, a lot of the people (who claimed to stand with the science) were wearing them everywhere.

However, without an extreme "other side to react to", they're not as quick to drop them.

Part of me wonders, if Trump were to make a comment like "I don't trust the latest CDC guidance, I think everyone should keep wearing masks", would we see that particular subset of people dropping the masks as quickly as they adopted them?

 

[KCfromNC]

I had thought about that aspect, but then remembered how quickly many were willing to adopt the policy of putting them on.

Yes, people responded quickly because the cost / benefit was clearly in favor of wearing them - people were dying. Now, the cost is a continued slight inconvenience for a few more weeks as the situation plays out. I don't imagine there's much comparison between the cases.

 

[RestoreTheJoy]

I had thought about that aspect, but then remembered how quickly many were willing to adopt the policy of putting them on.

The moment the CDC issued the guidance to start wearing them last year, there were people hitting the stores to buy them all up and start ordering them online, under the premise of trusting what the scientists say.

Now when the scientists say that it's okay for vaccinated people to remove them, many are being skeptical.

At the risk of sounding cynical, I think part of the quick adoption of masks by some, was specifically because of Trump saying he wasn't planning on wearing one
Trump says he won't wear face mask

CDC issued guidance for everyone to start voluntarily wearing masks on April 3rd 2020, a day later, Trump said he wasn't going to wear one, within a week, a lot of the people (who claimed to stand with the science) were wearing them everywhere.

However, without an extreme "other side to react to", they're not as quick to drop them.

Part of me wonders, if Trump were to make a comment like "I don't trust the latest CDC guidance, I think everyone should keep wearing masks", would we see that particular subset of people dropping the masks as quickly as they adopted them?

Call me skeptical of the bolded assertion that people scoured the stores and bought them up because of "trusting what scientists say", having watched first hand the eBay sellers scooping them all up to resell for vast profit (as well as toilet paper, disinfectants, Lysol, hand sanitizer, etc). They were eventually barred from doing so, but by then, there was a vast shortage.

Now, your second assertion of adopting masks "because Trump saying he wouldn't wear one" rings more true to me.

There are people so racked with hatred they would stop breathing if Trump recommended breathing. (eyeroll).

Remember how Harris wasn't going to take the "Trump vaccine", before staging a camera event once she could pretend he had no role it getting it out there.

So yeah...always follow the money and the motive (which is usually, but not always, money).

 

[hedrick]

One of the most interesting aspects of this is how much the medical community didn't seem to understand. It's not like this is the first epidemic, nor the first time people have used masks. So why did it take months to realize their usefulness? This article claims that the medical community and the physicists who study how aerosols work weren't communicating, and that it's only recently that things have begun to get clarified.

The 60-Year-Old Scientific Screwup That Helped Covid Kill

Here’s another interesting article attempting to explain why some studies show that masks are effective and some do not. Face masks effectively limit the probability of SARS-CoV-2 transmission
If they are right, masks are useful in many common situations but not all.

Of course the most recent CDC change isn't any change in knowledge, but recognizing that with increasing vaccination and decreasing spread, we're in a different situation. I agree that the way they announced was a mistake. They should have warned states first, and the announcement should have been clear that just because vaccinated people don't need masks with one another doesn't mean that you can remove mask policies when much of the population isn't vaccinated.

 

[wing2000]

I had thought about that aspect, but then remembered how quickly many were willing to adopt the policy of putting them on.

The moment the CDC issued the guidance to start wearing them last year, there were people hitting the stores to buy them all up and start ordering them online, under the premise of trusting what the scientists say.

In hindsight, the CDC was late in moving to that position, but at the time I remember thinking why are Asia and Europe masking up but not us? I recall relaying (on Facebook) a public service video from the Czech Republic encouraging people to mask up. So speaking for myself, there was no hesitancy to mask up as soon as the CDC announcement came.

Now when the scientists say that it's okay for vaccinated people to remove them, many are being skeptical.

Which is natural, given the personal loss many people have experienced - i.e. we now know the danger first-hand. Last March, I would have never imagined nearly 10k people dying in our county (pop 4.6 million). People may need time to lower their defenses as it were.

And moving forward, I may put on a mask again in certain situations such as traveling through International airports.

At the risk of sounding cynical, I think part of the quick adoption of masks by some, was specifically because of Trump saying he wasn't planning on wearing one
Trump says he won't wear face mask

CDC issued guidance for everyone to start voluntarily wearing masks on April 3rd 2020, a day later, Trump said he wasn't going to wear one, within a week, a lot of the people (who claimed to stand with the science) were wearing them everywhere.

I can't speak for other people. What Trump says certainly did not influence my decision. I do think Trump is responsible politicizing a public heath measure (masks), He not only failed to set an example (as any leader should), but undermined the efforts of US public health officials.

 

[ThatRobGuy]

I can't speak for other people. What Trump says certainly did not influence my decision. I do think Trump is responsible politicizing a public heath measure (masks), He not only failed to set an example (as any leader should), but undermined the efforts of US public health officials.

He absolutely did...there's no denying it. The economic metrics were the only strong part of his administration's track record (apart from some key moves in the middle east), and he exhibited covid-denialism in efforts to insulate that from anything that might disrupt it.

I've likened it to the scenario of, if a chef is only good at making pizza, and sucks at making everything else, he'll do anything in his power to make sure "pizza-night" doesn't get cancelled.

My point was just that the polarization has a multi-dimensional effect on the situation.

For every dogmatic person who wanted to align their positions with Trump to show everyone else how "pro-Trump" they were, there was a dogmatic person on the other side who did everything in their power to signal how "anti-Trump" they were.