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If many people do what you are doing, some percentage can get the virus and allow it to mutate further, reducing the vaccine efficiency, putting others to risk.

If many people do what you are doing, some percentage can get the virus and allow it to mutate further, reducing the vaccine efficiency, putting others to risk. Prisoner's dilemma at play. meta edit: I don't like your post becoming completely gray and therefore up-voted you. It's a view that many people hold and it needs to be answered not by screaming "down-vote the selfish!" but rather with good arguments.

hallway_monitor 5y ago
Oh 100%. It's a selfish play I admit. But if there's greater than zero risk of any long-term unknown effects from a vaccine, the number of people already vaccinated means the expected value is probably negative for anyone who hasn't been vaccinated yet.
- tux3 5y ago
  Ignoring the blatant disregard for the safety of others, your calculations are off the mark. The Delta variant is the only one you should be concerned about from here on. And a single dose of vaccine only provides minimal protection against it. For your scheme to be safe, you would need about 80% of people around you to have 2+ doses of a high-efficacy vaccine, and ideally all with Pfizer over Astra, given their relative efficacy. There's a greater than zero risk you're going about this wrong and will end up catching a new variant. Vaccination works, if you ACTUALLY GET THE SHOTS. Cheers
- devit 5y ago
  There seems to be a sizeable number of people who don't want to vaccinate, plus children under 12 won't be, and also the pandemic will survive in developing countries and travelers coming from them for a while. So I think the risk of getting infected in fall may well be significant enough to make taking the vaccine a good decision. Plus of course by vaccinating you no longer need to worry about minimizing infection risk, you don't need to get fake certificates to access things that are restricted to vaccinated people, you are free to travel to developing countries without risk. Also if you don't vaccinate now and the pandemic somehow has a resurgence you will have to rush to vaccinate then and stay at least month in full isolation while others who are vaccinated are freely going to events instead of doing the isolation now that events haven't fully resumed yet.
  - megous 5y ago
    Vaccination has its risks too. Long-term pain in the vaccinated shoulder, that will eventually spread to the other arm (due to sudden overuse), will not make you enjoy your life either. Having to test regularly may be less of a bother in life, if you lose this stupid vaccination lottery..., if you want to play on the convenience note.
makomk 5y ago
Realistically, there's basically no chance of vaccinating enough people fast enough on a global scale to stop the virus mutating further and reducing the vaccine efficacy, probably not even of reducing the odds of it that much, and it's not even clear that the countries with the best vaccine rollouts will manage to stop it spreading at this point. And that's despite vaccination on an unprecedented speed and scale for a disease this new, using technology that didn't even exist a few years ago.

hallway_monitor 5y ago

Oh 100%. It's a selfish play I admit. But if there's greater than zero risk of any long-term unknown effects from a vaccine, the number of people already vaccinated means the expected value is probably negative for anyone who hasn't been vaccinated yet.

tux3 5y ago
Ignoring the blatant disregard for the safety of others, your calculations are off the mark. The Delta variant is the only one you should be concerned about from here on. And a single dose of vaccine only provides minimal protection against it. For your scheme to be safe, you would need about 80% of people around you to have 2+ doses of a high-efficacy vaccine, and ideally all with Pfizer over Astra, given their relative efficacy. There's a greater than zero risk you're going about this wrong and will end up catching a new variant. Vaccination works, if you ACTUALLY GET THE SHOTS. Cheers
devit 5y ago
There seems to be a sizeable number of people who don't want to vaccinate, plus children under 12 won't be, and also the pandemic will survive in developing countries and travelers coming from them for a while. So I think the risk of getting infected in fall may well be significant enough to make taking the vaccine a good decision. Plus of course by vaccinating you no longer need to worry about minimizing infection risk, you don't need to get fake certificates to access things that are restricted to vaccinated people, you are free to travel to developing countries without risk. Also if you don't vaccinate now and the pandemic somehow has a resurgence you will have to rush to vaccinate then and stay at least month in full isolation while others who are vaccinated are freely going to events instead of doing the isolation now that events haven't fully resumed yet.
- megous 5y ago
  Vaccination has its risks too. Long-term pain in the vaccinated shoulder, that will eventually spread to the other arm (due to sudden overuse), will not make you enjoy your life either. Having to test regularly may be less of a bother in life, if you lose this stupid vaccination lottery..., if you want to play on the convenience note.

makomk 5y ago

Realistically, there's basically no chance of vaccinating enough people fast enough on a global scale to stop the virus mutating further and reducing the vaccine efficacy, probably not even of reducing the odds of it that much, and it's not even clear that the countries with the best vaccine rollouts will manage to stop it spreading at this point. And that's despite vaccination on an unprecedented speed and scale for a disease this new, using technology that didn't even exist a few years ago.