The safety of the new vaccine

Status
Not open for further replies.
SlurrySlump said:
I am beginning to wonder why we have so many Covid cases with so many people vaccinated.

How many "breakthrough infections" are being recorded daily. Is it with people who got the AstraZeneca vaccination?

Why aren't we being told this information?
Click to expand...

I'm a bit surprised about the rising cases myself given that we're coming out of summer, we still have many measures in place and we have large numbers vaccinated, and while the vaccines don't block transmission 100% the early indication were that it significantly reduced it. The delta variant has changed the rules of the game.

Why aren't we being told? Well, you are assuming we have even this information?

Information is still being collated on how the various vaccines fare versus the delta variant, but from the information in other countries there's nothing to suggest someone fully vaccinated with AZ is noticeably different than Pfizer or Moderna in protection.
In Israel, who were something of a trial country for Pfizer, there seems to be some concern that the protection given from Pfizer is dropping after 6 months and they are planning booster shots.
For all we know, AZ might afford longer term protection.

Given that the Janssen/Johnson&Johnson vaccine is single dose, that would be the one I'd be most concerned about versus delta variant.
If anyone should be targeted for booster doses, they seem to the ones who should be prioritised if over 50.

It's not authorised here, but there seems to be some indication that the Chinese vaccines are faring poorly versus the Delta variant.
The Russian Sputnik seems to hold up well, assuming you get a proper batch of it!
 
Last edited:
A few points... The vaccines significantly reduce the effect of the virus but don't fully prevent catching it or passing it on.

The delta variant is significantly more transmissible than the original... The US have estimated up to an R value or 8 or 9 which would be similar to chickenpox. Without high vaccination rates, it could be caught in seconds even outdoors. So the increase in rates need to be taken in the context of what could happen without vaccinations.

There are still pockets of population still partially or totally unvaccinated especially under 30. They are obviously pushing it hard but will need to get to over 80% of total population (or something similar) to bring down rates to close to negligible.
 
odyssey06 said:
Why aren't we being told? Well, you are assuming we have even this information?
Click to expand...
I would imagine that it would be a simple question to ask the infected person who has been vaccinated, what type of vaccine they were given? This information could then be used to target individuals who might need a booster.

It's a bit like the "community transmission". When the track and trace investigators were phoning people, they never seemed to ask people about their movements over the previous week. They only asked people who they were in contact with.
 
Look at the death rates in comparison to infections. There are much less deaths.

Our current daily cases are above two of our three previous peaks, but our deaths are at all time low.

Vaccine seems like a likely cause for that.
 
www.thejournal.ie

US drug regulator limits use of J&J Covid vaccine

The single shot vaccine is less protective than those developed by Pfizer and Moderna.
www.thejournal.ie www.thejournal.ie

I caught a mention of this yesterday but didn't really hear all the details, but I think it deserves to be highlighted.

For me it does show that despite the best technology available vaccines do have side effects and these will become more known as more data is collected.

This was inevitable but no doubt the actual facts will be ignored and the conspiracy theorists will use this news to further their various views.
 
I guess it's an interesting meta-analysis. I note that one of the lead authors receives funding from GlaxoSmithKline, and the WHO, and is on an advisory board for Moderna. Methinks the vaccines generally over promised and under delivered.
 
michaelm said:
Methinks the vaccines generally over promised and under delivered.
Click to expand...
I think that's more down to a lack of understanding among some who thought they would be a silver bullet. The medical community were always clear that wouldn't be the case, but some just didn't want to hear it. The data is out there to show how effective they were in preventing death.
 
The vaccinations seem to have made no difference to death rate amongst children and a negligible difference to under 50's. A more equitable global distribution targetted at over 50's and at-risk groups was perhaps the way to go.
 
I think there was a period where hopes rose for what the vaccines could do - for Alpha \ Delta variants there was good data showing reduction in infection \ transmission \ infectiousness of vaccinated to breakthrough infections.
Also, we didn't know what variants were around the corner.
We ended up with relatively mild Omicron, it could have gone otherwise.
So that was behind a lot of the rollout.

Then safety concerns emerged with some of the non mRNA vaccines which had been lined up for younger age groups and wider \ easier global distribution. Lots of non mRNA vaccines ended up getting destroyed I think. Had we only had the non mRNA vaccines, we would have still used them on older groups, but the risk v benefit analysis changed as you went down the age groups.
 
michaelm said:
The vaccinations seem to have made no difference to death rate amongst children and a negligible difference to under 50's. A more equitable global distribution targetted at over 50's and at-risk groups was perhaps the way to go.
Click to expand...
At first reading that might seem like the best call, but you have to consider the role of children as transmitters of the disease to parents / grandparents. In my extended family, the majority of cases trace back to the kids.
 
Yes, children were transmitters, as were we all. But the vaccination did not prevent infection or transmission. I don't know the numbers but I suspect that the vast majority of the population had Covid. 7 of 8 people in my house had it. Personally, I had 3 jabs and 2 doses of Covid.
 
michaelm said:
Yes, children were transmitters, as were we all. But the vaccination did not prevent infection or transmission. I don't know the numbers but I suspect that the vast majority of the population had Covid. 7 of 8 people in my house had it. Personally, I had 3 jabs and 2 doses of Covid.
Click to expand...
Vaccination did prevent (significantly reduce) infection and transmission for variants prior to Omicron, during the months after vaccination when antibodies were present (as opposed to longer lasting memory cells).
 
michaelm said:
Yes, children were transmitters, as were we all. But the vaccination did not prevent infection or transmission. I don't know the numbers but I suspect that the vast majority of the population had Covid. 7 of 8 people in my house had it. Personally, I had 3 jabs and 2 doses of Covid.
Click to expand...
Well the figures are available by a simple Google search, officially 1.6m people have had covid 19 but I suspect that its probably more but even at 25% more that 2m, I don't think it's that high but there is probably a considerable amount of people who didn't report symptoms online. Even at 2m and a population of 5.2m isn't even a majority let alone a " vast majority ". The " vast majority " would apply to the vaccine take up at over 90%

My own family of 4 has had 3 cases but using that isolated example doesn't extrapolate to the entire population, we are all vaccinated too.

Omnicorn and all its variants is substantially more transmisable in the population, add in that the vaccines effects do diminish over time, 6 months the agreed length of time.

Of course the "human effect " on the increase in transmissions is often overlooked, a vast minority are now not doing the basic good health practices that we know reduce transmission, mask wearing anywhere is probably less than 10% , hand sanitizing lower and some premises don't have sanitiser available including Dublin Bus.

Vaccines came with warnings that they alone were not the panacea of all aspects of the virus and we had a responsibility too by following good health practices, but its easier to blame the vaccines rather than human nature.

Vaccines has reduced transmission and saved millions of lives , the present estimates by the WHO, are the 20m people haven't died of Covid-19 due to vaccines.
 
Yeah, "vast majority" is likely a wild estimate. 'Majority' might have been more defensible. Personally, a sizeable majority of people I know have had Covid, a number have had it twice. Who knows how under reported it is. I didn't report either of my cases.
 
Last edited:
A friend had no problems with his first two vaccinations nor with his booster. He went for his second booster recently and was very unwell, with flu like symptoms for 24 hours. Is this common?
 
Tintagel said:
A friend had no problems with his first two vaccinations nor with his booster. He went for his second booster recently and was very unwell, with flu like symptoms for 24 hours. Is this common?
Click to expand...
That's how I felt after my first Pfizer vaccine...

By any chance was this booster Moderna and previous were Pfizer?
Anecdotally, Moderna seems to hit harder in terms of the temporary cold \ flu symptoms.
 
Yeah a lot of people I know (myself included), who initially got Pfizer for the first two and then Moderna for the booster, found the Moderna left us feeling a lot worse off for a day or two.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top