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> If the vaccine doesn't significantly stop the spread of the disease Multiple studies show that vaccinated people have significantly lower transmission than u

> If the vaccine doesn't significantly stop the spread of the disease Multiple studies show that vaccinated people have significantly lower transmission than unvaccinated. > In studies conducted before the emergence of the Delta variant, data from multiple studies in different countries suggested that people vaccinated with mRNA COVID-19 vaccines who develop COVID-19 generally have a lower viral load than unvaccinated people.(157, 165-169) This observation may indicate reduced transmissibility, as viral load has been identified as a key driver of transmission.(170) Studies from multiple countries found significantly reduced likelihood of transmission to household contacts from people infected with SARS-CoV-2 who were previously vaccinated for COVID-19.(171-176) For the Delta variant, early data indicate vaccinated and unvaccinated persons infected with Delta have similar levels of viral RNA and culturable virus detected, indicating that some vaccinated people infected with the Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2 may be able to transmit the virus to others.(163, 164, 177-180) However, other studies have shown a more rapid decline in viral RNA and culturable virus in fully vaccinated people (96, 177, 180-182). One study observed that Delta infection in fully vaccinated persons was associated with significantly less transmission to contacts than persons who were unvaccinated or partially vaccinated.(181) Together, these studies suggest that vaccinated people who become infected with Delta have potential to be less infectious than infected unvaccinated people. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/science/science-briefs/fully-vaccinated-people.html#infections-fully-vaccinated https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/science/science-br...

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
headsoup 5y ago
There's a lot of 'indicates' and 'suggests' and 'potential' there rather than clinical outcomes. Given how the unvaccinated are mostly locked out of things at present, current case trajectories and hospitalisations 'suggest' the overall vaccine outcome is not one that solves the problem in any meaningful way.
- hef19898 5y ago
  Last time I checked, invaccinated patients were vastly over repredented in hospitalization and ICU occupation. No indication, but hard facts. If vaccines prevent serious cases and hospitalization for a large percentage of people, and they do, we would be all good if vaccination rates reach sufficient levels. Until they do, the very limited ICU capacity will be taken up overpropertionally unvaccinated. And we will continue to have problems.
  - headsoup 5y ago
    What's a sufficient level then? It was once 70%, then 80, then 90. Now we have places pushing 95 and that's still not enough? Perhaps we should be paying a bit closer attention to what the vaccines aren't doing.
    - hef19898 5y ago
      No idea what a sufficient level is, Delta, Omicron and all that considered. Also, I am not into pandemic modelling. Since I don't necessarily care where the level right now is, peiple can always look up the latest papers and studies in that topic.
    - dzhiurgis 5y ago
      NZ has 95% rate and just got first omicron cases few days in strict quarantine. Will see how it will go.
      - hef19898 5y ago
        What a sufficient level is also depends on the goal: Eradicting Covid would require higher rates then just turning into a less serious endemic virus. Personally I think eradication is impossible by now.
      - refurb 5y ago
        Singapore hit 90%+ vaccination (eligible) a month ago and just got over a raging wave of Delta infections.
roenxi 5y ago
I'm reading between the lines here but the index case seems to have been vaccinated given that everyone else at the party. They infected everyone^. How much worse would this have been if an unvaccinated person had attended the venue? Realistically, if one person can infect 80, the vaccine is doing nothing to delay the spread. ^ Where today "everyone" is 70% of the partygoers.
- hnaccount_rng 5y ago
  But it did prevent the index patient from becoming seriously ill (i.e. hospitalised). It most likely reduced the initial dose of all that got infected by patient-0 [0]. And it most likely prevent _any_ of the invected to become hospitalised either. Now you can make the argument (or at least attempt to make this argument), that it would have been _better_ for patient-0 not to be vaccinated, because then, maybe, patient-0 would already have been sick and not at that party. Unfortunately this is the main problem of Covid in the first place: A significant portion of the downstream infections are generated before the onset of symptoms. So yes, the vaccine didn't prevent much of the spread [1], but it still reduces the amount of strain put on the health care system. Somewhere upthread there was the question: "How do the few unvaccinated overwhelm the hospital system?" The answer is: We can't deal with 1% of society being in the hospital. So getting 5% of all unvaccinated there and having 20% unvaccinated is already too much! Last year we managed, because we radically cut down on all interactions and delayed the spread that way. We _can_ do that again. But then this Christmas party just wouldn't have happened at all! [0] Note this is still somewhat a conjecture, as actually getting clean data for this is nigh impossible. [1] I'd still take the 30% reduction, but it's an upper bound and can still decrease. So yeah, let's call this "doesn't help slow down the spread"
  - roenxi 5y ago
    > ... but it still reduces the amount of strain put on the health care system Sure, but the case for a vaccine mandate pretty much collapses at that point. I have some anti-vaxxers living across the road from me who earn a lot of money. They'd be paying an above-average amount of taxes. So the mandate argument to them is essentially "well, we're going to force you to do something, otherwise you'd be more likely than average to consume services that you pay for". Now that is a good argument for getting vaccinated, no doubt. But it is a terrible argument for banning people from public life as a vaccine mandate requires if it is going to be implemented. It is also a bit questionable to be reaching out and forcing medical procedures on people based on being unwilling to expand the hospital system. If the unvaccinated were given an option to just pay for the extra capacity required (some form of insurance, dare I say) then they can get what they want and stay vulnerable at no cost to others.
NoPie 5y ago
That's true but the government data from the UK also showed that the vaccinated (age group above 30 years old) got infected more often than unvaccinated. The reasons are unclear, maybe it is the testing issue or that vaccinated are less careful with socialization and pay less attention to their symptoms and can even spread covid even more. Even if the data is suspect, it is a strong indicator that the difference between vaccinated and unvaccinated with regards to spreading of infection is not strong. As with all studies, they are not always able to predict actual effects in the community. It very much depends when the study is done, what variants are currently circulating, behavioural changes which are very hard to control etc.
- belorn 5y ago
  The theory that vaccinated people are less careful with socialization and pay less attention to symptoms is the exact same argument being made about masks. This makes agreeing or disagreeing with the theory a bit socially complex. If we agree that protections like vaccinations and masks do effect people to behave more risky, then the benefit of masks need to be balanced towards that negative effect. If we disagree that protections like vaccinations and masks do effect people to behave more risky, then the benefit of vaccinations need to be questioned. Either way we are questioning the effectiveness of masks and vaccinations, two topics which is quite controversial to question.
  - usrusr 5y ago
    Wow, that "people wearing masks will party like it's 2019" hypothesis is an interesting specimen: to me, almost two years into the pandemic it seems almost absurd, because when I put on a mask I'm immediately "pandemic me", with all the routine precautionary behavior patterns. I can only switch that off without a mask. But back in early 2020, those connections were not set up yet, it would have been quite likely that wearing a mask would have got the precaution box checked, leaving everything else "2019". At what point has it changed? Has it changed for everyone?
    - belorn 5y ago
      To me, putting on a mask is acknowledging of a high risk environment, like using a mass transportation during a pandemic. Airborne virus spread fast in crowded environment with limited ventilation, and if one has to be in such environment then doing anything to limit spread is good. The problem is when people started to use masks in order to allow themselves to be in an high risk environments. For my perspective here in Sweden, not much has changed from last time during the holidays and this year. People still seem to want something to allow them go into high risk environment, like Christmas parties, weddings, mass transportation travel, and shopping during rush hours. To me it the same people who went to those last year with masks that goes to those things this year with vaccines. Thankfully vaccines is at least more effective and thus the outcome seem less worse this year for the health care system.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

headsoup 5y ago

There's a lot of 'indicates' and 'suggests' and 'potential' there rather than clinical outcomes. Given how the unvaccinated are mostly locked out of things at present, current case trajectories and hospitalisations 'suggest' the overall vaccine outcome is not one that solves the problem in any meaningful way.

hef19898 5y ago
Last time I checked, invaccinated patients were vastly over repredented in hospitalization and ICU occupation. No indication, but hard facts. If vaccines prevent serious cases and hospitalization for a large percentage of people, and they do, we would be all good if vaccination rates reach sufficient levels. Until they do, the very limited ICU capacity will be taken up overpropertionally unvaccinated. And we will continue to have problems.
- headsoup 5y ago
  What's a sufficient level then? It was once 70%, then 80, then 90. Now we have places pushing 95 and that's still not enough? Perhaps we should be paying a bit closer attention to what the vaccines aren't doing.
  - hef19898 5y ago
    No idea what a sufficient level is, Delta, Omicron and all that considered. Also, I am not into pandemic modelling. Since I don't necessarily care where the level right now is, peiple can always look up the latest papers and studies in that topic.
  - dzhiurgis 5y ago
    NZ has 95% rate and just got first omicron cases few days in strict quarantine. Will see how it will go.
    - hef19898 5y ago
      What a sufficient level is also depends on the goal: Eradicting Covid would require higher rates then just turning into a less serious endemic virus. Personally I think eradication is impossible by now.
    - refurb 5y ago
      Singapore hit 90%+ vaccination (eligible) a month ago and just got over a raging wave of Delta infections.

roenxi 5y ago

I'm reading between the lines here but the index case seems to have been vaccinated given that everyone else at the party. They infected everyone^. How much worse would this have been if an unvaccinated person had attended the venue? Realistically, if one person can infect 80, the vaccine is doing nothing to delay the spread. ^ Where today "everyone" is 70% of the partygoers.

hnaccount_rng 5y ago
But it did prevent the index patient from becoming seriously ill (i.e. hospitalised). It most likely reduced the initial dose of all that got infected by patient-0 [0]. And it most likely prevent _any_ of the invected to become hospitalised either. Now you can make the argument (or at least attempt to make this argument), that it would have been _better_ for patient-0 not to be vaccinated, because then, maybe, patient-0 would already have been sick and not at that party. Unfortunately this is the main problem of Covid in the first place: A significant portion of the downstream infections are generated before the onset of symptoms. So yes, the vaccine didn't prevent much of the spread [1], but it still reduces the amount of strain put on the health care system. Somewhere upthread there was the question: "How do the few unvaccinated overwhelm the hospital system?" The answer is: We can't deal with 1% of society being in the hospital. So getting 5% of all unvaccinated there and having 20% unvaccinated is already too much! Last year we managed, because we radically cut down on all interactions and delayed the spread that way. We _can_ do that again. But then this Christmas party just wouldn't have happened at all! [0] Note this is still somewhat a conjecture, as actually getting clean data for this is nigh impossible. [1] I'd still take the 30% reduction, but it's an upper bound and can still decrease. So yeah, let's call this "doesn't help slow down the spread"
- roenxi 5y ago
  > ... but it still reduces the amount of strain put on the health care system Sure, but the case for a vaccine mandate pretty much collapses at that point. I have some anti-vaxxers living across the road from me who earn a lot of money. They'd be paying an above-average amount of taxes. So the mandate argument to them is essentially "well, we're going to force you to do something, otherwise you'd be more likely than average to consume services that you pay for". Now that is a good argument for getting vaccinated, no doubt. But it is a terrible argument for banning people from public life as a vaccine mandate requires if it is going to be implemented. It is also a bit questionable to be reaching out and forcing medical procedures on people based on being unwilling to expand the hospital system. If the unvaccinated were given an option to just pay for the extra capacity required (some form of insurance, dare I say) then they can get what they want and stay vulnerable at no cost to others.

NoPie 5y ago

That's true but the government data from the UK also showed that the vaccinated (age group above 30 years old) got infected more often than unvaccinated. The reasons are unclear, maybe it is the testing issue or that vaccinated are less careful with socialization and pay less attention to their symptoms and can even spread covid even more. Even if the data is suspect, it is a strong indicator that the difference between vaccinated and unvaccinated with regards to spreading of infection is not strong. As with all studies, they are not always able to predict actual effects in the community. It very much depends when the study is done, what variants are currently circulating, behavioural changes which are very hard to control etc.

belorn 5y ago
The theory that vaccinated people are less careful with socialization and pay less attention to symptoms is the exact same argument being made about masks. This makes agreeing or disagreeing with the theory a bit socially complex. If we agree that protections like vaccinations and masks do effect people to behave more risky, then the benefit of masks need to be balanced towards that negative effect. If we disagree that protections like vaccinations and masks do effect people to behave more risky, then the benefit of vaccinations need to be questioned. Either way we are questioning the effectiveness of masks and vaccinations, two topics which is quite controversial to question.
- usrusr 5y ago
  Wow, that "people wearing masks will party like it's 2019" hypothesis is an interesting specimen: to me, almost two years into the pandemic it seems almost absurd, because when I put on a mask I'm immediately "pandemic me", with all the routine precautionary behavior patterns. I can only switch that off without a mask. But back in early 2020, those connections were not set up yet, it would have been quite likely that wearing a mask would have got the precaution box checked, leaving everything else "2019". At what point has it changed? Has it changed for everyone?
  - belorn 5y ago
    To me, putting on a mask is acknowledging of a high risk environment, like using a mass transportation during a pandemic. Airborne virus spread fast in crowded environment with limited ventilation, and if one has to be in such environment then doing anything to limit spread is good. The problem is when people started to use masks in order to allow themselves to be in an high risk environments. For my perspective here in Sweden, not much has changed from last time during the holidays and this year. People still seem to want something to allow them go into high risk environment, like Christmas parties, weddings, mass transportation travel, and shopping during rush hours. To me it the same people who went to those last year with masks that goes to those things this year with vaccines. Thankfully vaccines is at least more effective and thus the outcome seem less worse this year for the health care system.