[arn]

This is firmly conspiracy theory territory however.

The vaccine certainly has side effects and there are going to be rare side effects that are severe.

But considering that 209 million people in the United States have gotten the vaccine -- if there were a high rate of serious side effects, there is no way that would be suppressed.

Even a 1% rate would mean there are over 2 million people that would have been affected.

[mlac]

You’re not wrong. I think the vaccine is much less likely to cause harm than the virus, and that it makes sense to get vaccinated.

But statistics don’t matter when you’re the one who wakes up paralyzed after getting the vaccine, and people are terrible at probability. But I think the failure to call that out and say “The vaccine’s not perfect, this is the challenge of our time and we need to take the vaccine to address it - some people will have adverse effects but it will save 100,000s of lives.”

Our circumstances have changed and we’re forced to choose between two outcomes that no one would want to decide on before the pandemic. But this is the reality, and if everyone took the vaccine we’d reduce resources used on hospitalizations and the stress on the healthcare system.