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by tata71 1612 days ago
What region do you think is going to achieve another +10% on their current "fully" vaccinated ratio?
2 comments

Most of the country. There are only a few places where the vaccination rate is already high enough that a mandate couldn't increase it at least 10%.

The scare quotes around "fully" are unnecessary. Two doses is enough to drive down hospitalization risk to flu levels. Boosters aren't necessary from a public health perspective because boosting the already vaccinated has a miniscule effect on total hospitalizations. (Sure, if you want them to reduce your own risk, that's fine because they have been approved. If you want them to reduce disruptions in your workplace, that is also fine. Just don't expect to materially impact health system availability.) Vaccinating the unvaccinated has a much larger effect. Alternatively, Omicron seems like it will reach them before mandates take effect or Paxlovid supply is ready, with worse outcomes on the health system.

> Two doses is enough to drive down hospitalization risk to flu levels. Boosters aren't necessary from a public health perspective because boosting the already vaccinated has a miniscule effect on total hospitalizations.

If you look at the data, it appears that vaccinating the young and healthy has "a miniscule effect on total hospitalizations", too.

There are very few young and healthy in the parts of the country where vaccination rates are low. The last Covid hospitalization surge in the US was mostly working age adults, whom the mandates would apply to.
> There are very few young and healthy in the parts of the country where vaccination rates are low

I'm not quite sure what to make of that claim. There are an awful lot of unvaccinated young people in the USA.

"13.2 million of US children and adolescents ages 12- 17 are fully vaccinated. [this] represent[s] 53% of 12-17 year-olds"[0] (as of 5 Jan 2022)

also

"Child vaccination rates vary widely across states. In 10 states, at least three-quarters of children (age 12-17) have received at least 1 dose, and in 16 states, fewer than 50% have received 1 dose."

[0] https://www.aap.org/en/pages/2019-novel-coronavirus-covid-19...

You missed the emphasized part of your quote, and you didn't quote whom the mandates affect.
I was talking ( see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29904115 ) about the effect of vaccinating the young and healthy, I didn't mention mandates...

You then said "there are few young and healthy in parts of country where vaccination rates are low".

I'm still not understanding that statement. Across the globe - and across the USA - there are loads of unvaccinated young people, and (happily) most of them are healthy, and (happily) the data show that young healthy people are at very low risk from Covid19 even without vaccination.

What do mandates have to do with any of that?

It appears that some regions may actually be at risk of driving ratios downwards as they shorten the validity of vaccination certificates for those already "fully vaccinated" but who haven't had additional shots since then.