4 ms·

Maybe I'm being naive, but 8.5% seems like a pretty small difference.

• peterfirefly 3y ago
  it's huge for something that should be close to zero if the vaccine had no effect.
• lkbm 3y ago
  Depends on what the actual risk is: > Using our regression discontinuity approach, we find that being eligible for the zoster vaccine caused a 1.3 (95% CI: 0.2 – 2.7; p=0.022) percentage point absolute, and 8.5% relative, reduction in the probability of a new dementia diagnosis over our seven-year follow-up period[0] 1.3% absolutely reduction seems like a big deal. [0] https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2023.05.23.23290253v1.full-text https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2023.05.23.23290253v...
• jryb 3y ago
  Although the magnitude is small, the interesting thing here isn't that you could get a shingles vaccine to marginally reduce your dementia risk, but that if one virus can cause dementia, it's probably not the only one.
  • jryb 3y ago
    Additionally, it could make understanding the mechanism much easier. Viruses are only so complicated, so learning what they're doing to the brain to cause dementia might reveal how other, non-viral causes work.