The vaccine against COVID-19 reduces its spread, even for the highly contagious delta variant. Perhaps more important, the vaccinated who contract the disease are likely to have a mild case, less likely to require hospitalization, and much less likely to be killed by it.
Maybe that’s why states with low vaccination rates have higher infection rates:
and states with low vaccination rates have higher death rates:
Lower infection rates, and especially fewer hospitalizations, is what our country’s health care providers are begging for. Maybe that’s why they’re begging us to get vaccinated against COVID-19.
The life you save may be your own.
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Open Mind 
Anti-vaxers like Joseph Mercola, RFK Jr, Mike “Health Ranger” Adams, Alex Jones, Simone Gold, Sherri Tenpenny, Br. Alexis Bugnolo and Jon Rappoport have a lot of innocent blood on their hands. They have been spreading the lie that the death rate from having the disease is lower than from taking the vaccine. They typically support that claim by misrepresenting VAERS (Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System) data.
In the United States the disease has killed 666,627 Americans, that we know of. (That’s from worldometers, yesterday.) That’s from 40,871,538 known cases (some of whom remain ill, and will also die), and probably 50-60 million unreported mild cases. That’s a fatality rate of >0.65%.
Additionally, there are hundreds of thousands of Americans who are suffering from lingering (and perhaps permanent) harm, from the disease.
Now, compare that to vaccination. We’ve had 185 million Americans vaccinated for Covid-19, so far, and there are a grand total of three (3) cases, so far, that we know of, in which someone died after getting vaccinated, and in which the circumstances of their death suggest that an unusual response to vaccination was the likely cause. That’s a 0.0000016% fatality rate from vaccination.
Even if there’ve been a few other deaths actually caused by vaccination, but not obviously attributable to it, that still means vaccination is around five orders of magnitude less dangerous than getting the disease while unvaccinated.
Anti-vaxers misrepresent VAERS statistics to claim vastly higher death rates from vaccination, but they are lying. This is my comment on that, which I posted on a Whiteboard Doctor video (but which YouTube censored):
In the early days of the pandemic, anti-vaxers typically claimed that Covid-19 was not very dangerous, or even that it was “no worse than flu.” With 2/3 of a million Americans dead from it that lie no longer works very well, so now they typically claim that various treatments, such as HCQ or ivermectin, are better options than vaccination.
There are several things wrong with that.
Most obviously, treatment vs. vaccination is not an “either or” proposition. Being vaccinated doesn’t preclude any treatment options if you have a breakthrough infection — and having been vaccinated greatly improves your chances of avoiding serious harm.
Additionally, even the most effective treatment of the disease could not, even in principle, significantly slow its SPREAD. That’s because most transmission occurs before the source patient is diagnosed, and so before he would be treated. Even if treatment helps him, it cannot act retroactively to prevent him from spreading the disease to others.
Vaccination prevents many infections, and thus reduces the spread of the disease, which therapeutics can never do.
The importance of that is, ironically, proven by the cases in which it fails. Because vaccination is less effective at preventing infections with the Delta variants, those variants are spreading, even as the original variants are fizzling out, and even though vaccination is still preventing most vaccinated people from getting life-threatening cases. Like partially-effective vaccination, or waning but non-zero immunity, effective therapeutics can (theoretically) prevent the disease from become life-threatening. But they can never significantly impede its spread.
That is a very big problem. The spread of Delta variants has caused a huge resurgence of the pandemic, which is killing at least 7000 people per day, in large part because only about 1/3 of the people in the world are vaccinated against Covid-19.
What’s more, the efficacy claims for treatments like HCQ and ivermectin are very dubious. Neither of them are “silver bullets.”
Ivermectin is more promising than HCQ; here’s a review:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34318930/
It says, “evidence on efficacy and safety of ivermectin for prevention of SARS-CoV-2 infection and COVID-19 treatment is conflicting.”
(OTOH, there’s nothing “conflicting” about the conclusive evidence that vaccination against Covid-19 is extremely beneficial!)
There’s a LOT of misinformation being circulated about ivermectin, much of it from a web site called “ivmmeta.” “Health Nerd” sent out an informative 39-part tweetstorm about it. Here’s the first tweet:
Here’s a compilation:
https://rattibha.com/thread/1422044335076306947?lang=en
There is some evidence (far from conclusive) that ivermectin might have some benefit for Covid-19 patients, but anyone who tells you that you should take ivermectin instead of getting vaccinated is trying to kill you.
What’s more, even if ivermectin (and/or some other therapy) were found to be very helpful for Covid-19 patients, vaccination would still be necessary, simply because immunity to the disease, by vaccination or by surviving an infection, limits its spread, and merely treating the disease cannot.
So if you don’t yet have Covid-19 antibodies (either through vaccination or “the hard way,” by surviving the disease), please get vaccinated ASAP.
I’ve had two jabs and am generally advocating vaccination. However, I do try to keep abreast of developments and this, from a White House press briefing, is concerning:
It’s not so much the waning immunity as the possible increased severity of disease, with the Delta variant, if someone vaccinated many months ago contracts the disease.
This is something I’m trying to find more information on as it may be a game changer for the vaccination campaign (I’m in New Zealand, by the way). Hopefully, it will turn out to be some bad data interpretation.
[Response: Let’s be clear: the phrase “increased risk of severe disease” refers to an increase RELATIVE TO when they were first vaccinated, NOT relative to when they were UNvaccinated. That protection wanes as time passes but still remains better than no vaccine at all — you’re NEVER advised to skip the vaccine.]
Thanks, Tamino. Yes, your interpretation is the most reasonable, especially when I look at the figures coming out of Israel, which don’t show a significant rise in severe illness for the vaccinated. Indeed, for the entire period of vaccination, they show that fully vaccinated (2 or 3 doses) cases are less likely to have severe illnesses. Phew!
Waning protection from vaccine is not impossible, and might be happening, but has NOT been well measured, and is not known to be significant yet. The US administration is running ahead of the evidence, causing no little consternation among many professionals. That evidence from Israel can evaluated from many angles. The gold standard would be a well-designed study randomly assigning subjects to booster or placebo, then following them until good stats accumulate. That has not been done. The groups compared in Israel may have other confounding factors within them.
Here is the news from Norway:
NIPH: Vaccinated have a low risk of serious illness with delta
Both partially and fully vaccinated people who receive covid-19 have a low risk of hospitalization, new studies from the National Institute of Public Health show.
At the same time, they state that best protection against infection with the delta variant is only achieved after the second dose. A study published in the journal Ā«EurosurveillanceĀ» has examined vaccine protection against the delta and alpha variants in Norway.
Among the partially vaccinated, 22 per cent did not become infected, while among the fully vaccinated, 65 per cent did not become infected.
The second study looked at the risk of being admitted to hospital with covid-19 for the vaccinated and unvaccinated. The results show that the risk of being admitted to hospital with covid-19 is reduced by over 70 per cent for the partially and fully vaccinated, compared with the unvaccinated.
The analysis also showed that the delta variant has not led to an increased risk of hospitalization in Norway, compared with alpha.
And more news from Denmark:
Danish study: Significantly greater risk for non-vaccinated of ending up in hospital if they are infected by the delta variant
Non-vaccinated corona patients who are infected by the delta variant have three times the risk of being admitted to hospital, a Danish study shows.
The study was done by the Danish Institute of Public Health Statens Serum Institut (SSI), Aalborg University and the Danish Covid-19 Genom Konsortium. The study is published in the journal The Lancet.
The study shows how important it is to be vaccinated, SSI points out.
Studies from other countries have shown similar results, but a Norwegian study has not demonstrated an increased risk of admission with the delta variant.
> This is something Iām trying to find more information on as it may be a game changer for the vaccination campaign…
Hmmm. Looks suspiciously like someone very concerned who’s just asking questions. If you get my drift.
I live in a county where the risks are extremely low.
I am convinced, on evidence. vaccination against covid far out weights the potential risks. Vaccination is not only for protection from your chance of death but also lower the odds for life altering effects from an infection or passing it on to others,
PLEASE Apply the same critical thinking techniques to the question of Covid responses as you would for climate change.
Get your shots.
Corona will stay for a long time if so many people refuse to get vaccinated. So please do. Don’t do it for mankind, the world or out of decency. Do it for you own safety>
I have noticed that the infection rate in several early high delta covid states has started to decline. Florida, Mississippi and Arkansas come to mind. In Florida, where I live, no action has been taken by the state to reduce spread and I have not heard that the other two took action.
Is it possible that these states are reaching herd immunity by everyone not vaccinated getting sick? I recently saw data from a large seropositive study but the data ended in May. Does anyone know of data on herd immunity in high covid states (or any states)?
Yes, herd immunity by spreading the infection to the entire herd. But Florida has had nearly 49,000 deaths so far acquiring natural herd immunity. In contrast, Norway has had 827 deaths so far, with about 1/4 the population of Florida. I think Norway has done a pretty good job of managing the pandemic, so if we use Norway’s result as the way to deal with a corona pandemic, then Florida should have had 4 x 827 = 3308 deaths by now. With 48,700 deaths, Florida has killed over 48,000 people needlessly to reach herd immunity.
Social distancing, good hygiene, masks, and now vaccines are meant to prevent those deaths. Nearly 80% over 18 in Norway are now fully vaccinated. I think Florida shows 54% over 16 fully vaccinated. The Norwegian public health institute recently suggested that getting infected with the Delta variant might be a better option than a 3rd shot if you get infected AFTER you are fully vaccinated. IOW, natural immunity to the Delta variant might be better than vaccine immunity IF you survive the infection. Being vaccinated nearly guarantees you will survive the infection.
Comparing results in Denmark with results in Florida to evaluate the efficacy of policies and interventions is probably not a good idea.
The same was true when covid “skeptics” were comparing Sweden to the US a year ago, to say we should have policies more like theirs. There are just too many confounds for these comparisons to be meaningful without including a very careful analysis.
Here’s one attempt:
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-021-95699-9
But it’s only one attempt.
Joshua, I don’t see your point. Sweden was never a COVID success story. Sweden now has 14,703 deaths, with a population of 10 million, compared to 827 deaths in Norway, with a population of 5 million. Until about 6 months ago, Sweden had done almost nothing compared to Norway and Denmark. Now Sweden has implemented much stricter measures, and they are comparable to their neighbors.
Again using Norway as the model, Sweden should have 1,654 deaths, not 14,703. And these deaths were happening when the “skeptics” in the US were comparing Sweden to the US.
Population density in Sweden, Finland and Norway are 25, 18 and 15 inhabitants per sq km respectively. Denmark is 137. UK is 281.
As far as I’ve tooled with the numbers, countries with low pop dens seem to do better than countries with the inverse. With that in mind, Sweden sticks out like a sore thumb, at least in Europe.
Via Worldometer, the COVID case count per million and the ranking for the countries mentioned are:
UK – 108,750 (25th)
Denmark – 60,967 (81st)
Sweden – 112,520 (23rd)
Finland – 24,546 (125th)
Norway – 33,299 (112th)
Mortality per million:
UK – 1979 (25th)
Denmark – 452 (107th)
Sweden – 1448 (43rd)
Finland – 189 (132nd)
Norway – 154 (142nd)
Martin:
I agree with you entirely. It is so sad that the USA has failed so badly. It will be interesting to see if anyone learns from this experience. Hopefully there will not be another pandemic that we all have to deal with.
From my personal point of view the question of weather herd immunity is near because of everyone not vaccinated getting delta covid is important. I am isolating and would like to get back on with my life. If everyone who is not vaccinated gets covid the disease will go away.
Do we have data on how long it might be to reach herd immunity by having 30-40% of the population get sick? I am hoping the reduced disease load currently in Florida is from nearing herd immunity by everyone getting sick. I know someone is collecting this data but do not know where to find it.
Apart from Peru (which is weird…), there are a few places where COVID deaths have reached ~3,000 per million (e.g. New Jersey, Mississippi, Hungary…). So with its current COVID death rate of 2,270 per million, I’d suggest that Florida is well short of herd immunity.
From a citizen of Quebec province (Canada) near Quebec city area (capitale nationale) it is very interesting to compare USA and Canada value
https://ici.radio-canada.ca/info/2020/coronavirus-covid-19-pandemie-cas-carte-maladie-symptomes-propagation/
The vaccination rate is more than 80 % here. The forth wave is claim to be non vaccinated one.
Actually for Quebec province we have about 700 new case for about 8 millions people. More important hospitalization is low….
Thank you Tamino : very interesting analyze… always.
Heard through work today:
“Vax it, mask it, or casket.”