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I'm a pro vax person, and I've had three vaccine doses. But I have a few anti-vaxers around in friends and family, and it can be hard to argue with them that v

I'm a pro vax person, and I've had three vaccine doses. But I have a few anti-vaxers around in friends and family, and it can be hard to argue with them that vaccines are totally safe and effective for them (not talking about the population as a whole). I would like safe and effective vaccines, and I would like to know that the vaccines I have been administered have really got the backing of truly scientific trials. Surely releasing the trial data is a net positive for all the national populations that have paid for it.

drukenemo 5y ago
In your definition, an anti-vaxxer is someone who refuses the covid-19 jab or any jab? If it’s the former, I find that quite disingenuous.
miles 5y ago
> it can be hard to argue with them that vaccines are totally safe and effective for them That is especially hard since there is simply no way to know for sure whether the vaccine will be "totally safe and effective for them": https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29206892 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29206892 .
Fogest 5y ago
This is my thing as well. I work at vaccine clinics and obviously am onboard with the vaccines, however I still feel bad helping administer these vaccines to people who are hesitant. Because of government vaccine mandates or employer vaccine mandates it has made some people who come in feeling "forced" to get a vaccine. And it honestly does not feel like this is the proper scientific or medical way. It sucks to give someone a vaccine when you know they aren't fully trusting in the science behind it. A lot of people are having to choose whether they put uproot their whole families and lose their jobs, or whether they just go and get the vaccine. They are not technically forced, but it honestly seems like it pretty much is. For me it does not feel morally right to have people who feel forced to make medical decisions they don't agree with without even having access to the raw data that would help indicate it's safe. And it doesn't help that there have been multiple leaks now regarding companies like Pfizer that have made them appear even more shady. Not to mention Pfizers multiple billion dollar lawsuits/fines in the past. I don't blame some people for being skeptical, nor do I blame them for feeling like they are forced to get something they aren't sure they can trust. It's hard to just trust an organization that has already done multiple things in the past to make you not want to trust them. The cases that feel even worse for me are the people who have had previous doses and are coming in for 2nd doses or boosters but have had previous unexplained side effects shortly after the doses. Like side effects that are beyond the "normal" ones. Many of these people have visited hospitals or their family doctors, had multiple tests, and get told that nothing is wrong, or that they are not sure what is wrong. And these kind of cases are often not counted an "adverse effect". I alone have had many people tell me these things. They often again feel forced to get the next dose because of pressure from their employer or government. And it just feels bad giving them the vaccine, because they don't sound anti-vaxx, they sound like they legitimately had a severe reaction to the vaccine. But often doctors and public health agencies will brush these incidents off and pretend like it's not because of the vaccine. They are dismissed and considered an anti-vaxxer making things up. And this really sucks. This is not the way medicine should work.
- diroussel 5y ago
  As far as I can see, in the UK, these adverse effects are not being logged or recorded in such a way that any analysis could be done to determine the scale, or even existence of any problem. I heard that there was a public database in US for this sort of thing. But it has it’s own problems about data quality.
  - Fogest 5y ago
    I'm in Canada and we do have an official way primary care doctors and public health officials and report and have adverse conditions investigated. The problem is that when a patient presents with symptoms that started shortly after the vaccine administration they are often dismissed by their primary physician. Often the doctors even do scans or blood work and they find "nothing" and deem the person being okay. Rather then doing further investigation the patient is often treated like they are making up symptoms or exaggerating. Basically they treat them like an anti-vaxxer instead of properly investigating their condition. They just tell them not to worry "it'll go away". We have people who come in to get additional doses and they'll mention having some pretty serious symptoms after their last vaccine and we will be so surprised with how often we are told they went to both the hospital and their family doctor and got zero resolution and the doctor did not report it to public health. In many cases we just seem them medically inelligble in these cases and tell them they need to go to their doctor and followup more to ensure they will be safe to get another dose. And this is where I think a lot of the problems with vaccine mandates and pressure from employers can lie. You end up with people who feel like they have no choice to get the vaccine, they have a bad reaction to it, and then doctors treat them like they are lying or that it's no big deal. Then they go for their next dose feeling even more untrusting of science and get another vaccine. We are ruining a lot of people's trust in science and medicine by how hard these things are pushed. Because of how much push back there is against anything negative with vaccines, it means doctors also often end up with this same bias. They are afraid to attribute any problem a patient has to the vaccine. I have no problem with vaccines and have 3 doses currently. But I can empathize with these people who feel hesitant and I myself definitely have lost some faith over the last year of doing this work. It really seems like a lot of scientific and medical standards have been tossed out the window because of politics.
ashtonkem 5y ago
> and it can be hard to argue with them that vaccines are totally safe and effective for them (not talking about the population as a whole). Right, and do you believe that a full release of the phase 3 trial data would convince them? I sure don't. Anti-vaxx is a fundamentally anti-expert stance, and most people have not logically convinced themselves into that position. Give them the full data set and I bet 9 out of 10 would ignore it, misinterpret it, read lies about it, or just assume that the data set is fake.
- diroussel 5y ago
  I don’t believe it will convince those that don’t want to be convinced. But I want to be convinced, and I want transparency in the science that my taxes are funding and in the enlightened society in which I wish to live. Transparency in science should include publishing raw data, as apart from re-creating the statistics in the report there is no other way the trial is repeatable.
  - ashtonkem 5y ago
    That’s moving the goal posts though. Now we’re balancing the privacy of those on the trial against your interest in seeing the data even though you’re already vaccinated. And you yourself don’t think that it would convince anyone that’s antivaxx. I don’t see the social benefit here, other than you’ll feel better. Furthermore, it’s not obvious full transparency will help. You’re almost certainly not a medical researcher, so it's not clear if you could do anything useful with the full data set. And our experience with VAERS shows that bad faith actors absolutely can and will lie about it. I see absolutely no upside to releasing the full data set, and a lot of downside for those who volunteered for the trials.

drukenemo 5y ago

In your definition, an anti-vaxxer is someone who refuses the covid-19 jab or any jab? If it’s the former, I find that quite disingenuous.

miles 5y ago

> it can be hard to argue with them that vaccines are totally safe and effective for them That is especially hard since there is simply no way to know for sure whether the vaccine will be "totally safe and effective for them": https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29206892 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29206892 .

Fogest 5y ago

This is my thing as well. I work at vaccine clinics and obviously am onboard with the vaccines, however I still feel bad helping administer these vaccines to people who are hesitant. Because of government vaccine mandates or employer vaccine mandates it has made some people who come in feeling "forced" to get a vaccine. And it honestly does not feel like this is the proper scientific or medical way. It sucks to give someone a vaccine when you know they aren't fully trusting in the science behind it. A lot of people are having to choose whether they put uproot their whole families and lose their jobs, or whether they just go and get the vaccine. They are not technically forced, but it honestly seems like it pretty much is. For me it does not feel morally right to have people who feel forced to make medical decisions they don't agree with without even having access to the raw data that would help indicate it's safe. And it doesn't help that there have been multiple leaks now regarding companies like Pfizer that have made them appear even more shady. Not to mention Pfizers multiple billion dollar lawsuits/fines in the past. I don't blame some people for being skeptical, nor do I blame them for feeling like they are forced to get something they aren't sure they can trust. It's hard to just trust an organization that has already done multiple things in the past to make you not want to trust them. The cases that feel even worse for me are the people who have had previous doses and are coming in for 2nd doses or boosters but have had previous unexplained side effects shortly after the doses. Like side effects that are beyond the "normal" ones. Many of these people have visited hospitals or their family doctors, had multiple tests, and get told that nothing is wrong, or that they are not sure what is wrong. And these kind of cases are often not counted an "adverse effect". I alone have had many people tell me these things. They often again feel forced to get the next dose because of pressure from their employer or government. And it just feels bad giving them the vaccine, because they don't sound anti-vaxx, they sound like they legitimately had a severe reaction to the vaccine. But often doctors and public health agencies will brush these incidents off and pretend like it's not because of the vaccine. They are dismissed and considered an anti-vaxxer making things up. And this really sucks. This is not the way medicine should work.

diroussel 5y ago
As far as I can see, in the UK, these adverse effects are not being logged or recorded in such a way that any analysis could be done to determine the scale, or even existence of any problem. I heard that there was a public database in US for this sort of thing. But it has it’s own problems about data quality.
- Fogest 5y ago
  I'm in Canada and we do have an official way primary care doctors and public health officials and report and have adverse conditions investigated. The problem is that when a patient presents with symptoms that started shortly after the vaccine administration they are often dismissed by their primary physician. Often the doctors even do scans or blood work and they find "nothing" and deem the person being okay. Rather then doing further investigation the patient is often treated like they are making up symptoms or exaggerating. Basically they treat them like an anti-vaxxer instead of properly investigating their condition. They just tell them not to worry "it'll go away". We have people who come in to get additional doses and they'll mention having some pretty serious symptoms after their last vaccine and we will be so surprised with how often we are told they went to both the hospital and their family doctor and got zero resolution and the doctor did not report it to public health. In many cases we just seem them medically inelligble in these cases and tell them they need to go to their doctor and followup more to ensure they will be safe to get another dose. And this is where I think a lot of the problems with vaccine mandates and pressure from employers can lie. You end up with people who feel like they have no choice to get the vaccine, they have a bad reaction to it, and then doctors treat them like they are lying or that it's no big deal. Then they go for their next dose feeling even more untrusting of science and get another vaccine. We are ruining a lot of people's trust in science and medicine by how hard these things are pushed. Because of how much push back there is against anything negative with vaccines, it means doctors also often end up with this same bias. They are afraid to attribute any problem a patient has to the vaccine. I have no problem with vaccines and have 3 doses currently. But I can empathize with these people who feel hesitant and I myself definitely have lost some faith over the last year of doing this work. It really seems like a lot of scientific and medical standards have been tossed out the window because of politics.

ashtonkem 5y ago

> and it can be hard to argue with them that vaccines are totally safe and effective for them (not talking about the population as a whole). Right, and do you believe that a full release of the phase 3 trial data would convince them? I sure don't. Anti-vaxx is a fundamentally anti-expert stance, and most people have not logically convinced themselves into that position. Give them the full data set and I bet 9 out of 10 would ignore it, misinterpret it, read lies about it, or just assume that the data set is fake.

diroussel 5y ago
I don’t believe it will convince those that don’t want to be convinced. But I want to be convinced, and I want transparency in the science that my taxes are funding and in the enlightened society in which I wish to live. Transparency in science should include publishing raw data, as apart from re-creating the statistics in the report there is no other way the trial is repeatable.
- ashtonkem 5y ago
  That’s moving the goal posts though. Now we’re balancing the privacy of those on the trial against your interest in seeing the data even though you’re already vaccinated. And you yourself don’t think that it would convince anyone that’s antivaxx. I don’t see the social benefit here, other than you’ll feel better. Furthermore, it’s not obvious full transparency will help. You’re almost certainly not a medical researcher, so it's not clear if you could do anything useful with the full data set. And our experience with VAERS shows that bad faith actors absolutely can and will lie about it. I see absolutely no upside to releasing the full data set, and a lot of downside for those who volunteered for the trials.