Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by TedPetrou 2026 days ago
I'm surprised so many people are excited about this. I have many concerns with the Pfizer vaccine

* 99.96% of the placebo group did not have a serious case of covid

* 99.25% of the placebo group did not get covid

* No one in the trial was deliberately inoculated - participants just lived their lives as normal.

* Only symptomatic participants were tested - this seems unbelievable to me - we have no idea what the actual incidence rate is because not everyone was tested

* Vaccines might just mask symptoms - since not everyone is getting tested, vaccine makers just have to make sure there are no symptoms. No symptoms equals no test.

* No trials done with two placebos - we need trials where both groups are in a placebo group. One gets a shot that gives a mild side effect and the other gives no side effect

* No trials done with unrelated immune boosters - we need to see how well this vaccine performs against other immune boosters. This could be a drugs or even supplements (vitamin D & C and exercise).

* Two shots were given in a trial lasting just 4 months - 4 months is an incredibly short amount of time to know whether it will be effective long term. It also gives Pfizer two chances to boost immune

* Long term health consequences of vaccine - we only have 4 months of data, which is way too short of time to see any longer term consequences

* There is a huge incentive to provide something that masks symptoms - billions of dollars are at stake. Big pharma is one of the very last companies I would trust with a novel vaccine

* No coronavirus vaccine in history - many coronaviruses currently circulate, but no vaccine has even been produced for them. It seems quite coincidental that humans finally put the pieces together for our current novel strand