[consp]

Keep in mind the following: the flue spike was without any decent form of measures. We can do a lot to reduce those.

Also note that while your anacdotal evidence is sad, it does not take into account that without those measures they might have been as badly off as well due to even more sick people being around at the same time. People easily blame measures but forget that the alternative might be even worse.

[cies]

> the flue spike was without any decent form of measures

I agree flu vaccines are worthless. :)

> People easily blame measures but forget that the alternative might be even worse.

Totally agree! But I'm just saying that the spike also contain collateral deaths (for lack of a better word). And yes it's totally anecdotal that I know two of those, and not know even one person who was even hospitalized from C19.

[tialaramex]

The effectiveness of seasonal Influenza vaccination depends on two things. First we have to guess which Influenza strains to vaccinate against, if we guess the wrong strains then it doesn't much matter that you're immune because you got a different strain anyway. Second the virus drifts even if we guess perfectly and it might evade the vaccine.

When you get the jab, both these things are still hard or impossible to know, so as long as the side effects of vaccination remain very mild for almost everybody it's worth a shot (pun intended). Some years it works very well indeed.

It's worth distinguishing between deaths due to measures imposed to manage the pandemic (which we could have hypothetically avoided by just allowing the pandemic to run its course, presumably killing millions more people) and those due to direct consequences of the pandemic which you can't avoid except by hypothesising "What if magically this virus didn't exist?". For example hospitals get overrun with patients and withdraw all but emergency care, resulting in excess deaths, but you can't wish that away. Or people are too scared of the virus to seek help so they die unnecessarily, again nowhere (except maybe China at the extreme?) told people "You must not leave your home to escape a violent partner" or "Don't call an ambulance if you have a heart attack, you might get infected" so those deaths aren't a result of a policy decision they're a consequence of the pandemic itself.

[ceejayoz]

There's a third thing: Not enough people take it.