Not necessarily. Yes, the risk from Covid-19 is larger. But you do not know how well the vaccine works for elderly people. If the protection of the vaccine is relatively low, just vacinating elderly people does not make a huge difference in the outcome, if the general population has a lot of infected people. Vaccination is only partly about protecting the individual and a lot about preventing the spread of disease.
Take Rubella. If you are not pregnat, which means every male, you are at no risk by the disease. But Rubella gets vaccinated against these days as a standard vaccination, as the best way to preent pregnant women to get infected is, to prevent the spread in the population. And it is really nastily infective. When I was in the last year of high school, we had a breakout and to my knowledge, every single pupil in that year got infected.
Maybe. You still have to be careful, though: your prior assumption is that older/sicker people are more likely to have side-effects from anything. It's also hard to find big enough groups of old/sick people to do sensitive statistical experiments.
On top of that, there are cases of many vaccines which are much less effective in the elderly.
While secondary causes are likely causing much of the higher mortality in the elderly, sometimes the immune system is just... not as strong. And yes, that does mean something other than COVID-19 could come along an 'get that person', but... here's my point:
Hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) induces neutralizing antibodies
(anti-HBs) that protect against HBV infection.
...
Response to vaccine following a 3-dose series is typically greater than
95% in young, healthy people, although it decreases with age (< 90%
response at age 40 and only 75% response at age 60). Other factors such
as smoking, obesity and chronic disease decrease vaccine efficacy and may
be used to predict risk of nonresponse.6 Adverse events are minimal,
although mild injection-site reactions may occur in 20% of recipients.
Quite a few vaccines are like this. Less effective on the elderly. So we could end up with an even larger horror show, with some COVID-19 vaccines.
Such as, it has some bad side effects, AND, doesn't really help the most-at-risk group as much as desired!
What really bugs me is, there are what? Greater than 70 vaccines in development?
Some governments have pre-picked supposed winners. On top of all the other political bull going on, are they going to stick with those winners, regardless of outcome? Or have preferentiality to those specific vaccines?
Because I can imagine some being highly effective and safe, and others being the reverse.
Absolutely. Prioritize those at highest risk of Covid complications (elderly, comorbidities) or those at high risk of exposure (front line healthcare workers).
It will be interesting once vaccines become available. Vaccinating several billion people will have a lot of operational challenges and will likely take upwards of a year to complete.
Take Rubella. If you are not pregnat, which means every male, you are at no risk by the disease. But Rubella gets vaccinated against these days as a standard vaccination, as the best way to preent pregnant women to get infected is, to prevent the spread in the population. And it is really nastily infective. When I was in the last year of high school, we had a breakout and to my knowledge, every single pupil in that year got infected.