[Dzidas]

"The data, which looked at more than 700,000 fully vaccinated people in Israel, found that only .04 percent of people contracted Covid-19, according to the head of Israel’s Ministry of Health, Dr. Sharon Alroy Preis at a press conference on Thursday.

The type of vaccine Israel has mostly used is the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine with a small number of doses from Moderna. The two vaccines use the same technology, and in clinical trials were found to be about 95% effective. " https://edition.cnn.com/world/live-news/coronavirus-pandemic... Can you share your datasource claiming that efficacy is only 50%?

[beagle3]

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.01.27.21250612v...

You’ll have to actually read it, or find a tldr from someone who knows what they are doing.

The same calc that leads to 0.04% above would say overall covid mortality is 0.08% and is intentionally misleading - but no news media so far (in Israel or outside) has done any review. They are all parroting the misleading numbers.

Anything but primary data these days is suspect. (Pfizer’s own primary data, btw, says severe disease is 75% RRR with CI 0-100%. Did you see anyone reporting on that?)

Edit: to add: Israel is an a horrible bind right now. The vaccine is only 50% effective but gov has done very badly in handling the disease and promoted the vaccine as “our way out”, so the gov is attempting to hide that data. Unfortunately for them, Israel is too small and the culture not supportive of hiding this, even if at this point the mass media is cooperating with the government.

[Adverblessly]

Quoting from the link you provided:

"We demonstrated an effectiveness of 51% of BNT162b2 vaccine against SARS-CoV-2 infection 13-24 days after immunization with the first dose. Immunization with the second dose should be continued to attain the anticipated protection."

I.e. if you take only the first dose of the two required then 13 days after taking it you already get an effectiveness of 50%. Therefore they recommend that people take the 2nd dose as prescribed. They don't mention effectiveness one week after the 2nd shot, which is what Israel considers to be immune (i.e. "green passport" status).

[beagle3]

The 95% everyone quotes is for mild disease.

For severe disease, Pfizer had 4 in the control group, and 1 in the vaccine group. That’s 75% RRR, with a confidence interval that spans 0-100%.

Look at the graphs here and in Pfizer’s. Immunity seems to taper at 12-18 days and stay there. The 2nd vaccine does not seem to confer more immunity - just expected to last longer time. This article looks at more severe disease than Pfizer’s 95% endloint (though possibly not severe as their “severe disease” endpoint - I don’t remember what definition each uses, but just in Israel the “severe” definition has changed several times)

[Ulrich2]

Please stop spreading lies. The paper is only about "The effectiveness of the first dose of BNT162 ..."

50% efficacy after the first dose is exactly the number that BioNTech reported in its Phase3 trial. So nothing unusual here. That is why the 2nd booster shot is needed to get to 95%.

[beagle3]

No it is not. Have you actually read either Pfizer’s report or this paper? Looked at their data?

The graphs, both in Pfizer’s original report and in this paper, show that past about two weeks, there is almost no change. Please look at the Pfizer graphs and tell me where the great advance is from 50% to 90%

Also, if yo actually read the Pfizer report, you’ll notice the 95% is for mild disease - a totally uninteresting result. For severe disease, it is 75% with a CI spanning the whole 0-100% range.

[Ulrich2]

Well, the solution to this dispute is easy => We just wait another 8 weeks:

(1) If am right, then Covid is gone in Israel by end of March.

(2) If you are right, Covid will be still a huge problem in in Israel.

[beagle3]

I won't hold you to this, even though you are guaranteed to lose in this bet even if you are right - because the trial for 5-12 that would allow to vaccinate them is not expected to yield any data until later than that. Even if you are right, it will still be here in that age group.

Also, there's a nature paper from last week that shows incredible correlation between Sun UVB at 34% of equator and the date that a wave starts. Covid will be gone by June, just like last year, thanks entirely to that effect (and possibly arrive again in Sep/Oct, or not). I'm not interested in meterology, but it's possible that even if I'm right, by end of March covid will be very dim in correlation with UVB exposure.

The amount of data actually attributable to cause and effect is incredibly miniscule. I do data science for a living. The headlines are basically all wrong, most discussions are, and quite a bit of the primary data cannot be right.

added: p.s - Did you actually read the papers before calling me a lier (or after?) or just did it based on headlines. I'm not holding it against you either way, just wondering.