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© Copyright 2022 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.Is Omicron leading us closer to herd immunity against COVID?
By VICTORIA MILKO NEW YORK©2024 GPlusMedia Inc.
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katy
Covid pandemic is as heavy rain
vaccines are as rain coat
with good rain coat you can walk under the rain , can get a little wet to your face but you not get soaked which you can get sick and die
Raw Beer
Yes, Omicron appears to be a great live attenuated vaccine. We should be very happy about this, but some are saddened by this because it means a lower return on their investments....
Aly Rustom
That's the biggest problem here. We need to get vaccines out to the developing nations and help them vaccinate their people
Was watching DW news and a german scientist was asked if it is possible that a new strain more deadly than Delta and more contagious than Omicron can emerge and the scientist said that scenario is plausible.
Fact is we don't know what the next strain will look like, so we can't make any predictions. We just don't know. What is certain is that as long as we hoard vaccines and not help the developing world get vaccinated we are playing with fire.
virusrex
That is false, he never said it was a better vaccine, that is just dangerous disinformation, he said it was providing immunity for more people (which obviously is a sad situation since vaccines would do the same with less risk).
Which still do not make it appropiate to bet with resources that other people could have found necessary, that is like a smoker saying that he is betting children that he is exposing with his second hand smoke would not get lung cancer.
By protecting much less than a booster of the available vaccines while producing many times more serious complications and death? that is the opposite of great, at least for people that actually are interested in public health instead of promoting anti-scientific agendas.
This is a forced interpretation that depends completely on ignoring the serious problems and risks that come with Omicron, vaccines are a much safer alternative to provide immunity so it is sad that people have to get it from the much more risky option.
Wick's pencil
Vaccines are like a rain coat that doesn't prevent you from getting wet...
These vaccines do not prevent infection, but Omicron will.
WilliB
virusrex
What serious problems and risks? We now know that Omicron is extremely mild.
Since everyone will get in contact with Omicron, this is not an "alternative". The choice is if you want to get mRNA shots in addition to Omicron or not.
Nobody claims any more that any of the existing vaccines provides "immunity". That claim has been dropped many months ago. The current claim is that they lower the risk of hospitalizations for a few month. Do you actually read any of these expert sources you constantly refer to?
virusrex
According to the best available science you are completely wrong, Omicron can't produce even a small fraction of the elevation of protection against other variants than what a booster cause, and its duration is predicted to be even shorter because of this lack of cross-neutralization. This means exactly the opposite of what you want to believe.
Look at the numbers even in Japan, people die from the infection, that is a serious problem and risk. You may want to downplay these fatal consequences, but that does not make them disappear, it evidence a complete lack of empathy.
Of course it is, if people is already immune thanks to vaccines then their immunity came from a much safer alternative. Specially taking into account the much higher protection it brings against other variants compared with the subpar immunity produced by omicron.
Between antivaxxers and other anti-scientific groups? that is the same as always, between health care professionals and scientist everybody does, because it is still true even when antivaxxers wants to misrepresent the meaning of "immunity" as if it meant perfect protection even from the first ever replication of a pathogen inside of the body. The same as many other vaccines COVID vaccines protect against the most serious consequences of the infection but not against mild or asymptomatic infection. People vaccinated against Polio, Measles, Rubella, etc. etc. do get infected during outbreaks, and some get a mild disease, but same as with the COVID vaccines fatalities become much more rare.