I hate threads like this on a coffee forum. But as a physician I felt I must say something. The population has great difficulty with uncertainty and probability. We live in a society where we want deterministic outcomes. If the weatherman says an 80% chance of rain, and it does not rain, he is criticized. Yet the ability to predict weather almost to the minute is dramatically better.
The real world data from all over the world with properly vetted peer reviewed studies shows huge benefit from the vaccinations. It is no contest. The public has such difficult understanding these numbers, because we all know people who are vaccinated who got COVID, myself included. The purpose of vaccination is to reduce morbidity and mortality to large populations. In some people it will prevent disease, but not all. This has been wildly successful. Areas where vaccination rates are low and masking is low have very poor outcomes. We have this in California where the “Red” counties have mortality rates more than double the “Blue” areas even adjusted for morbidity of the population. It is sad that it degenerates into a tribal or political group, rather than a true public health response.
Furthermore, this notion of somehow reducing or weakening the “immune system” is such an odd lay notion. Which part? Helper T cells? B cells? Interferon? The immune response of a human is remarkably complicated as it has been evolved over millions of years. It is so reductive to say something like it “weakens the immune system”. This is internet nonsense from a scientifically illiterate population.
And, these arguments often degenerate into internet snippets cherry picked for a point of view, which is often political. Useless. I live in the US, and our poor social distancing, and poor mask wearing ranks us near dead last of developed countries with regards to deaths per million population. Indeed, many 3rd world countries have done better than us. You Brits have half of our mortality, and have done a better job.
So, I will go back to coffee, and get my boosters when available as the science dictates.
