Relatives dying from Covid is much harder now that the vaccine is available.

[Spryte]

6 minutes ago, ktgrok said:

What kills me about people talking about the small risks with vaccines is all the OTHER risks they are willing to put in their body - from fast food to booze to drugs. Not saying this applies to the person you are talking about, but I know personally people who think the vaccine is toxic and risky but have done cocaine, do other recreational drugs, etc. I'm like..uh....you know that crap you buy from the guy your friend told you about doesn't have "full FDA approval" either, Right?

 

Yes.  The full sugar soda every day is risky, even.  There are all kinds of risks people are taking daily that are probably riskier than a vaccine.  (Ok, the soda example probably isn’t a good one as the risks it carries are cumulative over long periods, but there are so many risks, every day.)
 

Also, the “well, it’s only dangerous if you have pre-existing conditions, and I don’t have any” defense coming from a person who hasn’t seen a doctor for a check up in 15 years.  That one is eye-roll worthy.  I hear this one from overweight neighbors, who have bragged about not having a GP, and not having seen a doc in decades.  Obviously, they have no idea if they have pre-existing conditions. I don’t know either, but they sure look like poster children for high BP and cholesterol. I don’t understand their thinking.

[TravelingChris]

1 hour ago, Ordinary Shoes said:

My office is opening officially after Labor Day. Returning to the office is entirely voluntary and only vaccinated people are going to be allowed to return. Some people are furious about the vaccine requirement and I expect the policy will change in response. To be clear, the vaccine is NOT required to work. Just to come into the office. Most of us will never return to the office full time. 

My DH's company began returning to the office in May. DH is now supposed to be in the office every day but he's going to be allowed to work from home one day a week. He says that this is causing a lot of controversy in the office. People are starting to quit because they found jobs that allow employees to work from home. 

The pandemic was the first time that I've been allowed to work from home and I love it. My company took a survey of their office based staff and the response was overwhelming that people like the option to work from home most of the time. DH's company is old school and I suspect they will need to change or risk losing good employees. 

Yes, dd2 will never work in an office again, I think.  She is very allergic, anaphylactic, to citrus fruits including cleaning products with orange or lemon scent.  I don't know how many times she had to go home because someone brought in the fruits, perfume or used the cleaning products they were not allowed to use.  

DD1 had the option of going back or not and has chosen not to go back.  She deals with the pressures of her job much better at home and actually does a whole lot more work since no distractions of loud talking workmates.

DS had to quit his former job because of anaphylactic reactions that were getting worse and worse and has now a completely online job that has no in-person equivalents and he is very happy.  I think his fiancee has an online job too.

[TravelingChris]

56 minutes ago, ktgrok said:

What kills me about people talking about the small risks with vaccines is all the OTHER risks they are willing to put in their body - from fast food to booze to drugs. Not saying this applies to the person you are talking about, but I know personally people who think the vaccine is toxic and risky but have done cocaine, do other recreational drugs, etc. I'm like..uh....you know that crap you buy from the guy your friend told you about doesn't have "full FDA approval" either, Right?

 

You know the biggest reason I never did drugs- who knows what the h the criminal is selling to you- and currently with the whole problem of the overdoses it seems like a lot of people aren't getting what they bargained for.

But I am also one who thinks that the plan that happened in some part of NC where they had people going door to door with vaccines is horrific too.  I wouldn't trust that either.  I had my vaccine in a place full of medical personnel and a waiting period and all that.  How easy would it be for some killer to decide to pretend to be doing vaccines at your house and actually inject you with who knows what.

[Ellie]

On 7/16/2021 at 9:07 PM, Shelydon said:

I had several relatives and friends die from Covid in 2020 and early 2021.  A relative is in ICU on a vent and is not expected to survive the weekend. For some reason knowing she didn't have to get sick if she had chosen to get the vaccine makes this process much harder. 

I am so sorry (((shelydon)))

But surely you must know that none of the manufacturers claim that people who receive the injections will not get covid. The only claim is that if people who have received the vaccine actually do get covid, probably they won't be as sick as if they had not. Not only are there a number of cases where injected people did get sick anyway, there is a significant number of people who have died from the injection itself.

We just don't know enough. I know people who followed all.the.rules. and still got sick, and most of those felt like they had a mild flu. Researchers have been looking for a vaccine for HIV for 40 years and they are no closer now than they were when they started; how on earth could we expect a vaccine for this in such a short amount of time? 

Mr. Ellie and I are waiting until...something else happens. Until there's a treatment/real vaccine that has been tested on actual people, that does not kill those who receive it, that is an actual vaccine rather than something that supposedly teaches our bodies how to react to infection.

[ktgrok]

2 hours ago, TravelingChris said:

You know the biggest reason I never did drugs- who knows what the h the criminal is selling to you- and currently with the whole problem of the overdoses it seems like a lot of people aren't getting what they bargained for.

But I am also one who thinks that the plan that happened in some part of NC where they had people going door to door with vaccines is horrific too.  I wouldn't trust that either.  I had my vaccine in a place full of medical personnel and a waiting period and all that.  How easy would it be for some killer to decide to pretend to be doing vaccines at your house and actually inject you with who knows what.

Ok.....I thought I read too many suspense novels, lol, but I hadn't thought of that! Now I will though, lol. 

2 minutes ago, Ellie said:

 

Mr. Ellie and I are waiting until...something else happens. Until there's a treatment/real vaccine that has been tested on actual people, that does not kill those who receive it, that is an actual vaccine rather than something that supposedly teaches our bodies how to react to infection.

Um, it is an actual vaccine. And that's what vaccines do, they prime our body to react to infection. That's...what vaccines do. 

[Drama Llama]

8 minutes ago, Ellie said:

I am so sorry (((shelydon)))

But surely you must know that none of the manufacturers claim that people who receive the injections will not get covid. The only claim is that if people who have received the vaccine actually do get covid, probably they won't be as sick as if they had not. Not only are there a number of cases where injected people did get sick anyway, there is a significant number of people who have died from the injection itself.

We just don't know enough. I know people who followed all.the.rules. and still got sick, and most of those felt like they had a mild flu. Researchers have been looking for a vaccine for HIV for 40 years and they are no closer now than they were when they started; how on earth could we expect a vaccine for this in such a short amount of time? 

Mr. Ellie and I are waiting until...something else happens. Until there's a treatment/real vaccine that has been tested on actual people, that does not kill those who receive it, that is an actual vaccine rather than something that supposedly teaches our bodies how to react to infection.

Who do you think the vaccines were tested on? 

[ktgrok]

4 minutes ago, BaseballandHockey said:

Who do you think the vaccines were tested on? 

I forgot that part. Over 3.65 BILLION doses have been given to actual people worldwide. If billions of doses administered isn't enough...I don't know how many would be?

[pinball]

4 hours ago, Catwoman said:

There is nothing more that you or your dh could have done. You were being so careful! You and the kids were hardly going anywhere, and your dh couldn’t help it that he had to go to work in person. And your dh wore a mask like he was supposed to! There is literally nothing more that your family could have done.

I am so, so sorry for what happened. It was just the worst, most terrible luck ever. But never think for a moment that you could have prevented it. 

Sending you lots of hugs.

I agree with everything Catwoman wrote. 

And im just going to quote her because she said it much better than I could.

im really so sorry for all you’ve been through and the special, horrible pain that comes with losing your husband during a time like this, where you are subject to constant comments and surrounded by news and events related to the cause of his death. It must be like what war widows deal with. 

[kbutton]

 

5 hours ago, PeterPan said:

And people castigated me for saying this. I do think it will make a difference for whatever percentage of people were refusing mRNA vaccines who would be willing to take something akin to a flu vaccine. Even people who don't take a flu vaccine often have solvable reasons (minimal risk, don't want the aluminum/mercury/whatever). So I haven't checked on the novamax ingredients, but I think if it's skipping the preservatives and meeting what people perceive as a risk need, it will get accepted. 

So I do think you'll see seed shifts. He also took the FDA to task for not approving the mRNA vaxes fully. Imagine if the reason they're not approving them fully is the dangerous reactions. What if Novamax is able to be almost as good WITHOUT these dangerous reactions? At some point the people who waited might look back and be glad. 

Most traditional vaccines have preservatives--the mRNA ones don't. I think it's likely that Novavax will. Anyway...I wanted to know why you think it will make a difference, logically. 

As far as I can tell, the reasons that it will make a difference to people are illogical, but if they'll take the Novavax, I am happy, even if the reason for waiting is illogical.

I have an uncle that is basically all about the blood clot issue (and has had many of them himself because he has a clotting disorder). I don't know if he lumps the mRNA ones in with the blood clotting, or if he's against them. It's not all completely clear to me. I think it's an overblown fear given that Covid causes them too, and he has lifestyle choices that don't help him. However, he's been super careful. I think he is doing some outdoor things now, but he's been really locked down all year, interacts only with people who all but had a bubble (some exceptions for emergencies, etc.), and now mostly interacts with vaccinated family members. But we'll see. I would be giddy if he'd get Novavax, and I don't hold it against him that he's not getting the vaccine. But I do think he's coming down on the wrong side of risk.

I guess I thought there was something about the Novamax that was different from, say, J and J that would make them appealing to people, but I guess not. That's all I really wanted to know, not to castigate anyone. 

5 hours ago, regentrude said:

But isn't the J&J just that?

Exactly.

4 hours ago, dsmith said:

With J and J it's the stroke risk. I've tried, I really have...

At least that reason has some basis, sigh. 

[Drama Llama]

I wonder if there will be people who didn't get the mRNA vax, made public statements about it, and now regret it as they see the virus continue to kill, who will get Novavax as a way to save face, rather than admitting that they were wrong.

 

[KSera]

 

11 minutes ago, kbutton said:

I guess I thought there was something about the Novamax that was different from, say, J and J that would make them appealing to people, but I guess not. That's all I really wanted to know, not to castigate anyone. 

It appears to be much more effective than J&J, so that’s good. People might like having a more traditional shot that still gives really high protection. But I think the main thing with Novavax is what it means to the rest of the world. It’s effective and inexpensive and easy to store. I think over 1 billion doses are promised to developing nations. 

[kbutton]

2 minutes ago, KSera said:

But I think the main thing with Novavax is what it means to the rest of the world. It’s effective and inexpensive and easy to store. I think over 1 billion doses are promised to developing nations. 

Yes, that is exciting. 

[Not_a_Number]

1 hour ago, ktgrok said:

Um, it is an actual vaccine. And that's what vaccines do, they prime our body to react to infection. That's...what vaccines do. 

Ah, excellent. I was just going to say that, but you got there first. 

[regentrude]

2 hours ago, Ellie said:

that is an actual vaccine rather than something that supposedly teaches our bodies how to react to infection.

that is exactly what every vaccine does: teach our body how to react to an infection. It's the very principle of what "vaccination" means.

Edited July 20, 2021 by regentrude

[lauraw4321]

I do think we should have a different word for vaccines that prevent infections and vaccines that lessen the effect of disease but don't necessarily prevent illness/spread. Like the difference between flu vax and MMR. 

[ktgrok]

5 minutes ago, lauraw4321 said:

I do think we should have a different word for vaccines that prevent infections and vaccines that lessen the effect of disease but don't necessarily prevent illness/spread. Like the difference between flu vax and MMR. 

But there would need to be some weird arbitrary semantics there. I mean, with just the Pfizer Covid vaccine it prevents infection in 94% of cases with the wild version of the virus (which is about normal for any vaccine, really as some will not respond due to their own immune system), but only maybe 60% with the Delta variant, and in between with say, the Alpha variant. 

And with MMR, there are quite a few people on this board who do not respond to it, and did not get immunity from it. 

 

[Drama Llama]

6 minutes ago, lauraw4321 said:

I do think we should have a different word for vaccines that prevent infections and vaccines that lessen the effect of disease but don't necessarily prevent illness/spread. Like the difference between flu vax and MMR. 

But it's a continuum.  Few vaccines prevent 100% of infection, and few prevent zero.  Where would we draw the line?

[regentrude]

11 minutes ago, lauraw4321 said:

I do think we should have a different word for vaccines that prevent infections and vaccines that lessen the effect of disease but don't necessarily prevent illness/spread. Like the difference between flu vax and MMR. 

The flu vaccine is actually only effective in about 60% of recipients.

Breakthrough infections exist with other vaccines as well. Varicella, 85%. The breakthrough cases are milder. (However, if a disease is largely extinct because of herd immunity, it does not matter.)

No time to do thorough research, so wiki will have to suffice. Take it from there.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breakthrough_infection

Edited July 20, 2021 by regentrude

[lauraw4321]

7 minutes ago, BaseballandHockey said:

But it's a continuum.  Few vaccines prevent 100% of infection, and few prevent zero.  Where would we draw the line?

I suppose the difference I’m imagining is that disease prevention is a goal or a measure of the vax efficacy. It wasn’t a goal for the mRNA vaxxes. So I think it’s misleading to say that the vax is “90% effective” or whatever when the effectiveness is measured only by reducing severity of disease. I’m not saying it’s not extremely valuable. I’ve gotten it as has my oldest DD and husband.  But I think there should be more transparency about what a vax does or doesn’t do. Because many people think vax= disease elimination. 

[HeartString]

7 minutes ago, lauraw4321 said:

I suppose the difference I’m imagining is that disease prevention is a goal or a measure of the vax efficacy. It wasn’t a goal for the mRNA vaxxes. So I think it’s misleading to say that the vax is “90% effective” or whatever when the effectiveness is measured only by reducing severity of disease. I’m not saying it’s not extremely valuable. I’ve gotten it as has my oldest DD and husband.  But I think there should be more transparency about what a vax does or doesn’t do. Because many people think vax= disease elimination. 

I think that's a misunderstanding of vaccines.  I can see where that idea might come from, when you have really high vaccination rates it's very similar to having the disease eliminated.  But we've only ever eradicated 1 disease with vaccination, smallpox.  We  keep coming sooo close with polio, but keep missing it.  Vaccines are to prevent serious injury and death, not 100% of infections.  Breakthrough infections still happen, that's a known thing.  My fully vaccinated child got whooping cough for example.  But he survived it and only had what the doctor called a mild case.  Medical definitions for "mild" are different than a lay persons definition, because that was a perfectly miserable couple of weeks and it lingered for months.

 

ETA:  I think some of the difference is between what vaccines do for an individual and what they do for a community.  For the individual the make it far, far less likely that you will personally get the disease, and nearly eliminate the chance of getting so sick that you die from it if you do.  If a community is fully vaccinated, enough to reach herd immunity, you have very nearly effectively eliminated the disease in that community.  Its a two-fold plan. 

Edited July 20, 2021 by HeartString

[Shelydon]

3 hours ago, Ellie said:

I am so sorry (((shelydon)))

But surely you must know that none of the manufacturers claim that people who receive the injections will not get covid. The only claim is that if people who have received the vaccine actually do get covid, probably they won't be as sick as if they had not. Not only are there a number of cases where injected people did get sick anyway, there is a significant number of people who have died from the injection itself.

We just don't know enough. I know people who followed all.the.rules. and still got sick, and most of those felt like they had a mild flu. Researchers have been looking for a vaccine for HIV for 40 years and they are no closer now than they were when they started; how on earth could we expect a vaccine for this in such a short amount of time? 

Mr. Ellie and I are waiting until...something else happens. Until there's a treatment/real vaccine that has been tested on actual people, that does not kill those who receive it, that is an actual vaccine rather than something that supposedly teaches our bodies how to react to infection.

😳

[Sneezyone]

5 minutes ago, Shelydon said:

😳

HIV vaccine trials are, literally, underway. https://www.scripps.edu/news-and-events/press-room/2021/20210203-hiv-vaccine.html. I can't be the only one who's seen Descovy and Dovato ads lately either. They're everywhere and I don't even follow this stuff closely.

[Danae]

33 minutes ago, lauraw4321 said:

I suppose the difference I’m imagining is that disease prevention is a goal or a measure of the vax efficacy. It wasn’t a goal for the mRNA vaxxes. So I think it’s misleading to say that the vax is “90% effective” or whatever when the effectiveness is measured only by reducing severity of disease. I’m not saying it’s not extremely valuable. I’ve gotten it as has my oldest DD and husband.  But I think there should be more transparency about what a vax does or doesn’t do. Because many people think vax= disease elimination. 

The mRNA vaccines are 90% effective at preventing disease (possibly less with Delta.)  The initial initial trials, in order to move fast, didn’t test all the participants frequently so initially all that they could authoritatively say was that they prevented symptomatic disease.  Even then, though, the researchers said they probably also prevented infection and transmission, and later tests showed this to be the case.
 

The idea that mRNA vaccines don’t prevent infection and transmission is a holdover from the “we don’t know that for sure yet” time.

 

[lauraw4321]

21 minutes ago, Danae said:

The mRNA vaccines are 90% effective at preventing disease (possibly less with Delta.)  The initial initial trials, in order to move fast, didn’t test all the participants frequently so initially all that they could authoritatively say was that they prevented symptomatic disease.  Even then, though, the researchers said they probably also prevented infection and transmission, and later tests showed this to be the case.
 

The idea that mRNA vaccines don’t prevent infection and transmission is a holdover from the “we don’t know that for sure yet” time.

 

This is good to know. For me, it was a reasonable critique of the initial results. Unfortunately I think we’re going to find that number much lower with delta. 
 

I think that for most people effective = keep you from getting sick. When that metric isn’t even measured it’s harder to understand the value. 
 

I personally see the value as I’ve had the experience of having flu unvaxxed and vaxxed but pregnant. I barely realized I was sick when I was pregnant but had been vaxxed. Reducing severe disease is a great goal, but I don’t think it’s what most people expect from vaccines. Maybe it’s an unreasonable expectation, but it was certainly mine. I’ve never known someone to get rubella or measles or whooping cough, and in my mind that’s because of vaccines. Yet I don’t expect the flu vaccine to keep me from getting the flu. So it feels like a different category, even though I’m learning that it really isn’t. 
 

 

[Drama Llama]

7 minutes ago, lauraw4321 said:

This is good to know. For me, it was a reasonable critique of the initial results. Unfortunately I think we’re going to find that number much lower with delta. 
 

I think that for most people effective = keep you from getting sick. When that metric isn’t even measured it’s harder to understand the value. 
 

I personally see the value as I’ve had the experience of having flu unvaxxed and vaxxed but pregnant. I barely realized I was sick when I was pregnant but had been vaxxed. Reducing severe disease is a great goal, but I don’t think it’s what most people expect from vaccines. Maybe it’s an unreasonable expectation, but it was certainly mine. I’ve never known someone to get rubella or measles or whooping cough, and in my mind that’s because of vaccines. Yet I don’t expect the flu vaccine to keep me from getting the flu. So it feels like a different category, even though I’m learning that it really isn’t. 
 

 

The pertussis vaccine (Whooping cough) is actually a lot like the covid vaccine in that for some people it prevents disease altogether, and for some people it causes a milder version of the illness.  

[Not_a_Number]

15 minutes ago, lauraw4321 said:

Reducing severe disease is a great goal, but I don’t think it’s what most people expect from vaccines.

But I think the point is that the trials did measure symptomatic disease. What they didn't measure was whether there were people who "had COVID" via PCR test but remained entirely asymptomatic. 

[HeartString]

9 minutes ago, lauraw4321 said:

This is good to know. For me, it was a reasonable critique of the initial results. Unfortunately I think we’re going to find that number much lower with delta. 
 

I think that for most people effective = keep you from getting sick. When that metric isn’t even measured it’s harder to understand the value. 
 

I personally see the value as I’ve had the experience of having flu unvaxxed and vaxxed but pregnant. I barely realized I was sick when I was pregnant but had been vaxxed. Reducing severe disease is a great goal, but I don’t think it’s what most people expect from vaccines. Maybe it’s an unreasonable expectation, but it was certainly mine. I’ve never known someone to get rubella or measles or whooping cough, and in my mind that’s because of vaccines. Yet I don’t expect the flu vaccine to keep me from getting the flu. So it feels like a different category, even though I’m learning that it really isn’t. 
 

 

The difference there is that rubella and measles are one, discrete virus, where as what we call the flu is a category or family of virus.   There are dozens of flu viruses.  Being vaccinated against 1 gives minimal protection against 2-25. 

I have learned through all of the COVID stuff that some of the difference  is how fast a virus attacks the body.  The way I heard it explained is that it takes a certain amount of time for the body to spin up an immune response to a virus and it takes each virus a certain amount of time to make you sick.  With measles your immunized body can spin up a response faster than the measles can get a chance to make you sick.  The flu virus is faster at attacking than the measles virus, but your body is still working at the same speed.  So the flu vaccine is just simply not as effective because of the nature of the virus. 

I think we tend to think of "virus" as one sort of thing, but that's not right.  One virus can be as different from the other as one mammal is from another.  You need a different sort of thing to fight off a squirrel than a hippo, than a killer whale, even though all of those are mammals.  Same with measles and flu, or Covid, or HIV. 

[happi duck]

Vaccines need to be taken up in greater percentages to look like what we tend to picture when we think "vaccine".

Afaik, there have been measles outbreaks in places where vaccine uptake dropped and so when measles entered the area it had lots of places to " go", kwim?

[HeartString]

4 minutes ago, happi duck said:

Vaccines need to be taken up in greater percentages to look like what we tend to picture when we think "vaccine".

Afaik, there have been measles outbreaks in places where vaccine uptake dropped and so when measles entered the area it had lots of places to " go", kwim?

That's a really good point.  We have just over 50% of the country vaxed against COVID and only like 1% of the world. The measles and Polio are around 90% of the country.  Pertussis is 80%.  That's just a world of difference.  That's the difference between heard immunity and not. 

[Not_a_Number]

1 hour ago, HeartString said:

That's a really good point.  We have just over 50% of the country vaxed against COVID and only like 1% of the world. The measles and Polio are around 90% of the country.  Pertussis is 80%.  That's just a world of difference.  That's the difference between heard immunity and not. 

OK, it's more like a quarter of the world 😛 

[PeterPan]

10 hours ago, regentrude said:

But isn't the J&J just that?

I have a relative who took it recently. I was surprised because I figured nobody bothered with it anymore given how dramatically more effective the mRNA vaxes are.

4 hours ago, KSera said:

 

It appears to be much more effective than J&J, so that’s good. People might like having a more traditional shot that still gives really high protection. But I think the main thing with Novavax is what it means to the rest of the world. It’s effective and inexpensive and easy to store. I think over 1 billion doses are promised to developing nations. 

Exactly.

 

[HeartString]

25 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

OK, it's more like a quarter of the world 😛 

That’s better! I knew it was something low. Now I have to figure why 1% is in my brain.  🤦‍♀️  

Edited July 20, 2021 by HeartString

[Not_a_Number]

Just now, HeartString said:

That’s better! I knew it was something low.  

Yes, it's definitely too low, but at least it's not 1%! 

[HeartString]

6 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

Yes, it's definitely too low, but at least it's not 1%! 

Africa.  Only 1% of Africa is vaccinated.  I must have only half listened to a podcast and got the Africa stat mixed up with the whole world stats.  I knew something was only 1%.  

[Not_a_Number]

26 minutes ago, HeartString said:

Africa.  Only 1% of Africa is vaccinated.  I must have only half listened to a podcast and got the Africa stat mixed up with the whole world stats.  I knew something was only 1%.  

Yeah, that sounds right, unfortunately 😞 . 

[TravelingChris]

2 hours ago, PeterPan said:

I have a relative who took it recently. I was surprised because I figured nobody bothered with it anymore given how dramatically more effective the mRNA vaxes are.

Exactly.

 

My older brother got the J and J in Los Angeles.  I don't know when he got vaccinated -maybe at a time when he couldn't get the nRNA vaccines because they were reserved for others?  I didn't ask but did let him come here.

[regentrude]

8 hours ago, PeterPan said:

I have a relative who took it recently. I was surprised because I figured nobody bothered with it anymore given how dramatically more effective the mRNA vaxes are.

For some people I know, the fact that it's one-and-done is the reason they choose J&J.

[Laura Corin]

26 minutes ago, regentrude said:

For some people I know, the fact that it's one-and-done is the reason they choose J&J.

Are there figures for J and J and Delta? One jab of AZ doesn't give much protection. 

[MEmama]

40 minutes ago, regentrude said:

For some people I know, the fact that it's one-and-done is the reason they choose J&J.

My MIL chose the J&J for this reason.

She wouldn’t have gotten vaccinated at all except her kids denied her the opportunity to visit her grandchildren unless she got on board. She doesn’t really believe in COVID or that she needs protection, though. I’m very concerned about her upcoming visit. They take zero precautions and are coming from a deep red/ high caseload, low vax state.

[MEmama]

16 minutes ago, Laura Corin said:

Are there figures for J and J and Delta? One jab of AZ doesn't give much protection. 

My understanding is that the protection is pretty low. I consider it partially vaccinated against Delta especially. 

[Pawz4me]

The people I know who opted for J&J did so mostly because they believe vaccination will be required to travel easily, especially cruises. They think Covid is overblown and aren't worried about getting it. So . . one and done, just to meet any requirements that will enable them to do what they want to do.

[Jean in Newcastle]

2 hours ago, Pawz4me said:

The people I know who opted for J&J did so mostly because they believe vaccination will be required to travel easily, especially cruises. They think Covid is overblown and aren't worried about getting it. So . . one and done, just to meet any requirements that will enable them to do what they want to do.

This is what I have seen as well. 
 

There are also a number of retired military personnel who got J & J simply because that’s what the VA was giving out. 

[TravelingChris]

I have no idea why my brother got the J and J.  He has all sorts of strange beliefs- with eating, with refusing to get eyeglasses or contacts, etc though I am sure he is not any sort of Q Anon person.  Maybe he just trusted the J and J technology more though he is not anti technology at all or maybe it was just the easiest to get at the time he was getting it.  I know he is into travel nowadays so I could see him trying to boost with mRNA at some point if that is a preferred vaccine someplace.

[Soror]

3 hours ago, Pawz4me said:

The people I know who opted for J&J did so mostly because they believe vaccination will be required to travel easily, especially cruises. They think Covid is overblown and aren't worried about getting it. So . . one and done, just to meet any requirements that will enable them to do what they want to do.

The two people I know that got JJ did it for a cruise. They hadn't planned to get vaccinated at all but had to in order to go. They went with the easiest option as they are not concerned about getting Covid.

Edited July 20, 2021 by Soror

[kbutton]

13 hours ago, lauraw4321 said:

Reducing severe disease is a great goal, but I don’t think it’s what most people expect from vaccines. Maybe it’s an unreasonable expectation, but it was certainly mine. I’ve never known someone to get rubella or measles or whooping cough, and in my mind that’s because of vaccines. Yet I don’t expect the flu vaccine to keep me from getting the flu. So it feels like a different category, even though I’m learning that it really isn’t. 

I agree with others that it's different in our mind because we've mostly achieved herd immunity, but I agree that it's not what people tend to think. They often do on this board, but we're weird on here, in a good way.

I understand it a little better because DH is in healthcare, but he's not as likely to discuss all the nuances with me as the board is, so I understand it much better having been on here when vaccines have been discussed in the past.

13 hours ago, HeartString said:

The difference there is that rubella and measles are one, discrete virus, where as what we call the flu is a category or family of virus.   There are dozens of flu viruses.  Being vaccinated against 1 gives minimal protection against 2-25. 

I have learned through all of the COVID stuff that some of the difference  is how fast a virus attacks the body.  The way I heard it explained is that it takes a certain amount of time for the body to spin up an immune response to a virus and it takes each virus a certain amount of time to make you sick.  With measles your immunized body can spin up a response faster than the measles can get a chance to make you sick.  The flu virus is faster at attacking than the measles virus, but your body is still working at the same speed.  So the flu vaccine is just simply not as effective because of the nature of the virus. 

I think we tend to think of "virus" as one sort of thing, but that's not right.  One virus can be as different from the other as one mammal is from another.  You need a different sort of thing to fight off a squirrel than a hippo, than a killer whale, even though all of those are mammals.  Same with measles and flu, or Covid, or HIV. 

That's interesting!

2 hours ago, Pawz4me said:

The people I know who opted for J&J did so mostly because they believe vaccination will be required to travel easily, especially cruises. They think Covid is overblown and aren't worried about getting it. So . . one and done, just to meet any requirements that will enable them to do what they want to do.

I think there were people here who really needed the shot to be one and done for scheduling purposes, especially college students. I am not sure all colleges were equally helpful about having students miss class to recover from one of the mRNA shots, and often you can't really schedule around times when you have a lot of high-stakes projects or tests. One friend ended up getting Pfizer based on her doctor's recommendation, but because she'd had really bad reactions to flu shots in the past (days of being sick), she was thinking one shot encounter sounded way better than two. 

For a while, here, what you got depended on where you got your shot, and people who really wanted to be vaccinated were taking what they could get.

I got in asap (Pfizer, thankfully), but I truly believed that if I passed up a shot, I might not get the chance later. I thought we'd vaccinate the willing and then ship it all to other countries, TBH. I am shocked that the reluctant are still able to get a vaccine. I am not the only one that thought the opportunity could pass, and I bet some of those folks got J and J solely because it was available. (Additionally, I know some people waited partly because they remember the flu pandemic in the 60's and remembered a big push to get people vaccinated, and then, all of the sudden, it was over, they didn't need the vaccine, etc. I considered this wishful thinking, but it's one of many things people considered.) 

[catz]

I was going to say I know a fair number of young people who got the J&J because it was easy to schedule and that's what my son's college campus was offering for a bit before students left campus in the spring.  I wouldn't assume anyone taking it thinks covid is a hoax, etc.  Really when it was first rolled out and it was marketed as an equally good option.  I get a flu shot every year and I have never had the flu those years and that has less efficacy.  But I have had it multiple years where I delayed getting it for one reason or another.   I kind of assumed J&J would roll out their 2 dose study and most of those people would be encouraged to get a booster at some point.  

  

[regentrude]

2 minutes ago, FuzzyCatz said:

I was going to say I know a fair number of young people who got the J&J because it was easy to schedule and that's what my son's college campus was offering for a bit before students left campus in the spring. 

I know a bunch of college students who preferred the J&J because they didn't become vaccine eligible until rather late in the semester, and scheduling two shots to be done before leaving town (with any possible side effects after the second dose not affecting finals week) was just logistically extremely difficult.

[Jean in Newcastle]

4 minutes ago, FuzzyCatz said:

I was going to say I know a fair number of young people who got the J&J because it was easy to schedule and that's what my son's college campus was offering for a bit before students left campus in the spring.  I wouldn't assume anyone taking it thinks covid is a hoax, etc.  Really when it was first rolled out and it was marketed as an equally good option.  I get a flu shot every year and I have never had the flu those years and that has less efficacy.  But I have had it multiple years where I delayed getting it for one reason or another.   I kind of assumed J&J would roll out their 2 dose study and most of those people would be encouraged to get a booster at some point.  

  

Good point about the booster.  I also assumed that J & J would offer a booster.  But perhaps the clotting thing derailed that? 

[Danae]

21 minutes ago, FuzzyCatz said:

I was going to say I know a fair number of young people who got the J&J because it was easy to schedule and that's what my son's college campus was offering for a bit before students left campus in the spring.  I wouldn't assume anyone taking it thinks covid is a hoax, etc.  Really when it was first rolled out and it was marketed as an equally good option.  I get a flu shot every year and I have never had the flu those years and that has less efficacy.  But I have had it multiple years where I delayed getting it for one reason or another.   I kind of assumed J&J would roll out their 2 dose study and most of those people would be encouraged to get a booster at some point.  

  

I know several people who got it early when getting an appointment for any vaccine was a triumph and the guidance was "whatever shot you're offered, take it."

It turns out if they'd waited a few weeks they would have had their pick of vaccines and appointment times, but they didn't know that at the time.

[Lady Florida.]

On 7/19/2021 at 12:09 AM, PeterPan said:

I've met some health care workers who were anti on the mRNA covid vax. Do you think these people are anti *all* vax or only the mRNA? I'm just wondering (and anecdotes would suffice) whether a shot that is more like the flu shot (which the novamax appears to be) will be differently received. Had they previously taken the flu shot or had they usually refused that too?

In this case unfortunately no. These are the same nurses who complain about the fact that annual flu shots are required as a condition of employment. They don't vaccinate their children, and not for legitimate medical reasons. They're truly anti-vax. 😢