[burnafter182]

Isn't this logically inconsistent? The vaccinated should be protected by the vaccine, and thus little to no threat should exist.

Ah but the vaccines are leaky you say, the vaccinated can acquire and spread the disease, and they can do so asymptomatically. And to that I propose a question: are the vaccines definable as effective, that being the case? If you're so positive of the vaccine, shouldn't your whole family unit be vaccinated? Children aren't very susceptible to the disease. Once boosters are deployed to the aceding population, will that cause a paradigm shift? Once a large proportion of children are vaccinated? Once we hit the constantly moving target for "herd immunity"?

No, it's all or none. It's arbitrary. It is not logically consistent. It is government policy in a nutshell.

People die constantly. Attributing causality exclusively to COVID19 is asinine. Even using an aggregate like excess mortality is a fool's errand. It's been clear since the beginning that comorbidity in combination with COVID19 is what typically causes death. Any numbers pulled to evidence how deadly COVID19 is are fraught with interdependencies and overlap and hardly present a true to life picture.

It's naive to think you can save everyone. It's okay that you're afraid.

[woodruffw]

> Isn't this logically inconsistent? The vaccinated should be protected by the vaccine, and thus little to no threat should exist.

This isn't why we encourage mass vaccination. We encourage mass vaccination because herd immunity protects everyone, including people who can't be vaccinated for legitimate reasons (allergies, immunocompromised status, &c).

I'm young and healthy; my chances of severe illness from COVID are extraordinarily low. I didn't get vaccinated primarily for my own protection; I did it because I have friends and family who need it more than I do, and whose return to normal life is predicated on the participation of society as a whole.

The rest of your post is misinformed about the role vaccines play, and would be addressed by improved public education about immunity, improved immune responses, and lower incidence of severe cases. Individual vaccines produce different outcomes along each of those axes, which has (understandably) produced a great deal of confusion as to whether the COVID vaccines "prevent" COVID or not. But the information is available, and it's incumbent upon you as a member of civil society to avail yourself of it.

> It's naive to think you can save everyone. It's okay that you're afraid.

What?

[swader999]

You can't get herd immunity with a virus that evolves this fast and can persist in animal reservoirs with a leaky vaccine.

[woodruffw]

Yes, you can. Herd immunity as a public health policy includes protection from severe illness; COVID vaccines have consistently been shown to provide protection against severe illness even when new variants appear.

Also, to point out the absurdity with all of this: we wouldn't have as many variations as we currently have if people were to actually get their vaccines. Handwringing over variants while also resisting the chief tool we have for reducing the likelihood of new variants is ridiculous.

[swader999]

I agree the vaccine does decrease the incidence of severe illness, even in the new variants. Based on this fact it should be given to the vulnerable.

A policy of mass vaccination to protect the vulnerable is a different thing and is more related to the concept of herd immunity. It can be very bad policy depending on the nature of the virus. Its really good policy for something like measles. Here's a link that takes a deep dive on how this relates to covid and the corona virus: https://www.juliusruechel.com/2021/09/the-snake-oil-salesmen...

[woodruffw]

I did a brief parse of that site, and it's the standard crank spiel about anything vaguely pharmaceutical (plus some "Great Reset" dogwhistling and bloviating about America's founding fathers). He even threw in a Sherlock Holmes quote; how can I argue with that?

Yes, pharmaceutical companies are bad. They're so bad that it's a trite and tired observation to base conspiracy theories on. Nothing written therein changes the fact that the shot is free for you and produces improved healthcare outcomes. The US government already spends hundreds of billions of dollars keeping people alive after decades of damaging their bodies; paying a few billion more for some vaccines is hardly worth a global conspiracy.

[swader999]

Agree with your criticisms but his points on herd immunity are pretty good. If you want a more scientific dive into it this Alberta neurosurgen did a pretty good analysis on some of the same aspects, all referenced: https://www.lifesitenews.com/opinion/not-justified-canadian-...

[burnafter182]

Explain to me how exerting selection pressures through a leaky system prevents the likelihood of variants.

And to evince you of known hazards of leaky immunity, I suggest you look up Marek's disease.