[throwaway20851]

>50% of Americans are apparently not willing to be vaccinated to begin with and rollout to significant parts of the population is going to take months.

COVID-19, which is now endemic, will be here for the remainder of my lifetime. The vaccines have unknowns. I see less risk for both myself and family with avoiding the vaccines until there is strong data about their efficacy and safety.

>While I'm obviously glad that vaccine development happened quickly, I really wish rather than being so focussed on vaccinations exclusively we paid more attention to the fact that some countries, Taiwan, China, Singapore, New Zealand and Australia have managed to quell the disease through correct social policy and appropriate levels of social coordination.

They're either islands, took authoritarian measures, or both. And again, an endemic virus that will only come back as soon as international travel comes back and lockdowns go away.

[maxerickson]

There is strong data about the safety and efficacy of the vaccines.

We don't have long term data on either of course, but the data that has been collected so far paints a clear picture of safe, effective vaccines.

[throwaway20851]

>There is strong data >We don't have long term data

No.

[maxerickson]

They are different things. And the efficacy data is good enough to not be part of the question (if most people get vaccinated the virus goes away).

[throwaway20851]

>(if most people get vaccinated the virus goes away).

Polio. And these COVID-19 vaccines do not grant indefinite immunity.

95% efficacy is not realistic. We struggle to hit 60% with influenza vaccines.

[maxerickson]

We don't know how long the immunity from the vaccines will last.

The flu is a very different virus, so it's not really a useful comparison (mutates faster, etc).

I guess there will be plenty of proof in the coming months (in either direction really, it will be reasonably clear if it works as well as has been stated).