230 million Americans have gotten covid vaccines, totaling over 600 million doses. Let’s say for the sake of argument that the covid vaccines are not “very safe.” What would you expect the result of 600 million not very safe vaccination doses to be?
More than 13 billion doses of covid vaccine have been administered worldwide.
If it were very dangerous, we’d know.
On the other hand, it’s fairly common for people to feel shitty for a day after getting a covid vaccine. I don’t think it’s crazy that many low-risk people decide they don’t want to do that again.
(Note for the Europeans: the US and Canada are recommending a fall booster for everyone over 6 months old.)
Both myself and my wife had zero reaction to our Pfizer booster a few weeks ago, but almost everyone I know who had received the Moderna has been wiped out for at least 24 hours. YMMV.
The disposable ones are good for many hours of wear, and are cheap and generally more comfortable than the good reusable ones.
I use disposable bandages, too. It seems worth it to me.
There are good and useless reusable masks. The good ones can cite data. But most of them don’t hold up very well to being washed, which seems like an important part of actually being reusable.
I watched about half this, and the Vogmask held up the best, with an 80% efficiency after being washed 5 times. A lot of them were reduced to “no better than a cloth mask”.
I am curious if there are firm, well-supported numbers on just how many people feel really bad after a COVID vaccine, how severe are the reactions, and how long are these reactions?
My spidey sense is that truly bad reactions (let’s define that as ‘can’t resume normal functions the next day’) are actually numerically uncommon, but those that do experience such reactions - collectively - make A LOT of noise about it online. And then it becomes something “everybody knows” - that “COVID vaccinations put you out of service for a day or two, every time.”
Kind of a similar thing to satisfied customers of a product generally keeping silent, while unsatisfied customers are motivated to leave negative reviews, tell others of their negative experiences, and so on.
And it’s not that some individuals don’t get truly laid up after a COVID vaccine. It’s a matter of how common such reactions actually are when you take it out of the realm of the anecdote.
For my first several COVID shots, I answered V-SAFE questions at intervals, so there’s a pretty big database of responses about side effects. Right now, they’re collecting RSV vaccine responses.
Mr. Mallard and I had the same experience.
I only chose Pfizer because I wanted the set (one Astra-Zeneca and otherwise all Moderna before that).
I had more trouble with Moderna than my lovely wife had with Pfizer this time around.
I wouldn’t call that a truly bad reaction. I’d call that an unpleasant reaction.
And i guess there’s a range between “couldn’t have resumed normal functions in an emergency” and “felt shitty enough to take the day off and not do anything”. Even the latter is a disincentive to get vaccinated again. (Where a slightly sore arm probably isn’t much disincentive for most folks.)
And if it happens 5% of the time, I’d call it common. Common enough for people to reasonably be concerned it might happen to them.
I think I’ve had seven doses now, and my reaction has been getting progressively worse. I had a mildly sore arm the first time. I had chills and body aches and a headache and spent a day in bed the most recent.
I have friends with reactions all over the map. From “nothing, not even a sore arm” through two who had a scary enough immune response that their doctors are involved, and one has been told to avoid future covid vaccines. Feeling shitty enough to take a day off is fairly common.
I had my first Moderna vaccine this fall; all the previous ones have been Pfizer. I also got flu, RSV, and Tdap vaccines within the span of a week. I think the pairs were RSV and flu, then Covid and Tdap the following week, although I’m not certain. I felt kind of lousy for two days after the second set, which I know included the Covid. After all the previous Covid vaccines, I felt fine. This is complicated by the fact that I invariably have an unpleasant reaction to Tdap vaccines that lasts one or two days.
True. And this forum is also pretty strongly pro-vaccination.
– I had less reaction to my covid booster this fall than I did to one of the earlier ones. But in any case, for now 5 data points, I haven’t had any reaction that put me entirely out of commission or made me feel really awful; just sore arms (but not too sore to use the arm) and fatigue, and after one (I think the third) feeling unspecifically crappy for one morning, after which I was fine; and during which I wasn’t in significant pain or anything, I just . . . felt unspecifically crappy.
Not, however, remotely as crappy as I would have felt in hospital on a ventilator. Or even in hospital not on a ventilator.
I felt vaguely crappy/tired for ~a day and had a sore arm for ~3 days after my most recent Covid booster (last Friday). However I also simultaneously got my Tdap, pneumococcal and flu. So four shots, two per arm. I was pretty certain I as going to feel crappy afterwards, one way or another 
.
Previous boosters have been all over the map and with not much regard to brand (I’ve had a fairly thorough mix of Pfizer and Moderna by this point). Some have made me mildly ill for a day or two, some just a sore arm for 12 hours. I don’t even try to predict, I just assume any vaccination is liable to make me feel at least a little woozy and live with it.
Tdap always knocks me out. I wouldn’t get it with anything else.
Yes, it’s definitely still a good bet for the immune compromised and older folks (like most people here.) I’m not so certain it’s warranted for healthy young adults who have prior exposure to covid (either from vaccination or from infection) unless they live or work closely with more vulnerable people.
I pushed my kids to get previous vaccines. I’m not pushing them this time.
I had the shivers after each of my jabs, the AZ one being the worst. But yeah much better than alternative outcomes, I thought. Unlikely for me being relatively young and healthy but who wants to roll that dice? The antivax stuff tends to be more about hard to prove things like high blood pressure, heart problems, cancers.
Worth noting that often the boosters are given during the exact season when there’s a high chance of catching a coincidental cold (or flu or COVID) at the same time
I don’t know whether CDC’s changed their advice recently; but unless they’re definitely saying otherwise, I’d lean heavily in favor of keeping everybody vaccinated (except of course anybody who really medically shouldn’t be.)
The CDC and Canada are recommending boosters for almost everyone. The UK and most EU nations are not. They don’t recommend annual flu shots for healthy young adults, either.
UK is only allowing people over 65, and those with immune issues, to get it.
Germany only those over 60:
With its choice to target only the elderly, at-risk or chronically ill people, residents of care homes, healthcare professionals and those in close contact with vulnerable people, Germany is broadly in line with other European countries, such as France, Italy or Britain.
I’ve had trouble digging up nation-by-nation recommendations, but it looks like Japan is making the updated vaccine available to everyone, but only recommending it to older and higher-risk people
The only reference i found for South Korea was too vague to bother linking. It said they are getting a modest shipment of updated vaccine.
I’m curious what Australia and NZ are doing.
A friend of mine has decided she won’t be getting any more vaccinations.
This upsets me for so many reasons, but it basically comes down to the pernicious influence of anti-vaxxers. This is a friend with comparatively little education, and no science background, and I hate that social class and education level are a factor in public health AT ALL.
The person is also a grown-ass adult, so other than talking about my own plans to keep following recommendations, I have no standing to object or try to influence.
Well, just got the whole shots battery this afternoon: Covid, Flu and RSV. So far nothing unusually different from prior times to report. I expect to have this become a feature of every October from here on.
Last year in the UK I pushed for a booster and got one despite being too young (said I lived with my parents, they aren’t CEV but are a little over 65, and they were like “Hmmm… alright”), not sure this year.
As I understand it (I may be wrong I can’t remember the exact source) the rationale is that below a certain age the risk from the now much tamed virus is not too dissimilar to the risk of the vaccine. Both being tiny risks for comparatively young and healthy people. And that the old rationale about reducing transmission doesn’t apply now that it’s so transmissible and the vaccines have more of a symptom reduction effect than sterilising immunity