Covid Vaccine issues

[chaggle]

I believe (open to correction as always) that the current vaccines are known to prevent the development of the illness or reduce its severity, but it is not known that any of them stop infection or onward transmission of the virus to other people.

Surely there is therefore an enhanced risk to those who remain unvaccinated for whatever reason. There will be any number of vaccinated people who up to now will feel ill or even be hospitalised but will, when vaccinated, be carrying on their lives as normal therefore spreading infection.

There is much talk of herd immunity but surely that will only happen if the vaccine arrests infection, not just stops the infected person becoming sick.

[Matt]

I suspect that it's matter of how much rather then whether. It's clear to me that if a vaccine attenuates the speed with which the virus replicates inside the body of the vaccinated then there will be less viral particles being emitted by the infected person and they would do so for a shorter time. As such they should be less infectious.
So not it may not eliminate infection or onward transmission but should certainly reduce it.
I'm assuming that the reason we know less about how much these factors will be reduced is that it's simply harder to measure.
There is of course an existing risk of asymptomatic transmission. It's possible that this would increase in the post vaccine world but this layperson would be surprised if that overwhelmed the general effect.

However more than happy so be corrected by a more knowledgeable source or indeed by the emerging facts as the roll-out proceeds.

[chaggle]

Let's hope.

I'm sure cleverer people than me have thought this through.

[chaggle]

Van Dam has just said they don't know.

Worrying I think.

[polomint38]

I'm hoping it unleashes my latent superpower like in The 4400 or The Boys.
Just wondering what my power will be.

[chaggle]

Also, following a mass vaccination programme, IF it stops illness but allows infection, testing becomes irrelevant.

More and more people will be carriers.

We will have created an army of asymptomatic carriers.

I'm sure I must be wrong about this.

[Tony.Williams]

Would this matter, chaggle? From a UK perspective, if everyone in the country were asymptomatic carriers, what would be the practical difference between that, and no-one having the disease? Of course, that might result in other countries banning visitors from the UK, but given the rate that Covid is spreading, that would only be a temporary problem - the whole world would soon be asymptomatic carriers, except for those who had not managed to get the vaccine.

[chaggle]

This is what I was alluding to here.

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/ ... 1bP3FkQ2yM

“One thing that’s not quite clear to me is what rules are applied to people who’ve [had the vaccine], have we got a get out of jail free card?

Kate – whose husband, Derek Draper, has been in hospital since March due to Covid-19 complications – then interjected, telling Johnson: “I think they have made that quite clear, actually, Stanley.

“Your son has been saying this isn’t just ‘carry on in a carefree way’ [after the vaccine], because we don’t know actually whether the vaccine protects you from spreading infection, and if it works, if it only reduces the impact of symptoms, which is a huge thing, but still means you have to be very careful.”

So IF the vaccines ONLY ameliorate the illness but ALLOW infection and onward transmission they will have in no way protected the non-vaccinated eg. the 5% failures and the allergic (and the refusers but who cares about them anyway).

And it carries on forever.

(although I'm with Matt on this - I think they are being cautious and the vaccines will curtail infection.)

[chaggle]

...and sorry Tony - missed your post.

The difference is that there will always remain an unvaccinated sector of the population who will be more at risk because of the vaccinated - and therefore immune but infectious - majority.

[Tony.Williams]

The difference is that there will always remain an unvaccinated sector of the population who will be more at risk because of the vaccinated - and therefore immune but infectious - majority.

But presumably not for long...

[chaggle]

The difference is that there will always remain an unvaccinated sector of the population who will be more at risk because of the vaccinated - and therefore immune but infectious - majority.

But presumably not for long...

Indeed - they'll die off over time.

Incidentally, Matt Hancock confirmed just now that they still don't know that the vaccines curtail transmission.

Seems to me that unless they do we can forget herd immunity.

[chaggle]

The vaccination programme advances.

It seem that whatever else the UK government has got wrong, this seems to be going OK.

Just had a warning on GMB though - it could actually make things worse as people assume that the vaccination gives them immunity from infection and transmission and relax distancing measures.

[Matt]

It's almost as if they let the professionals handle it rather than outsourcing it to their mates with zero capability or experience.

[Tony.Williams]

It's almost as if they let the professionals handle it rather than outsourcing it to their mates with zero capability or experience.

What a radical notion...

[chaggle]

(given that these vaxxes might not confer any herd immunity)

Up to now I 've had a 'feck 'em - let the ignorant twots die' attitude to COVID vax deniers.

Am I allowed to hold this view now that we know that an astonishingly high proportion of the BAME community are in this group?