What do we know about the vaccine's safety? Could it be the case that it has rare harms that take months or years to manifest? I am really curious, because from where I stand, the majority of people are rushing to get the vaccine and so forth without even questioning the safety of it, but I am skeptical (perhaps due to my ignorance). I would personally rather wait years with it before I feel comfortable getting it. As far as catching COVID-19 goes: I am pretty sure I had it, as someone I live with was tested positive. We were asymptomatic.
That is the case with any infection/immunization which changes our immune system. There will be some people who will react differently down the line from what would have been had they not been vaccinated. People who had chicken pox show up with shingles later in life.
I understand that, I just have concerns regarding the safety of this particular vaccine. They say it is revolutionary, but if this is really that, then is this not a new vaccine with unknown long-term risks? I read this on CDC's website: "There are currently no licensed mRNA vaccines in the United States. However, researchers have been studying them for decades.". This is not too convincing still.
It is also a matter of helping society as a whole: by vaccinating you take the very small risk of having side effects (so far 400k were involved in phase III trials worldwide), while having the huge benefit for society that you are really helping the most fragile. And many times you may not realize that they are near us: for example people with low immune defenses because of diseases that you will never know about. I will definitely take it as soon as available.
This is a very exciting new vaccine. And that's exactly why we shouldn't skip the usual extended 5-year, 10-year studies before giving it to a billion people.
There are potential long-term side-effects for this vaccine that we couldn't possibly know about yet (will it affect the fertility of your future children, for instance? Will it affect your cognitive function within a year? Ten years? Nobody knows). And what exactly is causing the Bell's Palsy, and how is that cause going to interact with people's predispositions to develop other neurological conditions as they get older? We also don't yet know about the costs and benefits beyond a very short timeline relative to not having it; is the immunity conferred amongst the population more or less effective than that which people are developing naturally as they come into contact with strains of the virus that are more infectious and less lethal? For that matter, how does does immunity for this virus even work, antibodies or T-cells? If we're in a position where we understand this virus enough to be rolling out mass vaccination in a responsible way, why are we relying on flawed PCR testing (especially in terms of the elevated numbers of cycles) to track cases and justify the rushed deployment of vaccines, especially in the case of this highly experimental (albeit exciting) one? These are all questions that I would expect the regulatory authorities to have answered definitively and to be broadcasting widely before any widespread program of vaccination. Especially seeing as the manufacturers have been released from liability from the vaccines' effects.
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[ 3.1 ms ] story [ 23.7 ms ] threadThere are potential long-term side-effects for this vaccine that we couldn't possibly know about yet (will it affect the fertility of your future children, for instance? Will it affect your cognitive function within a year? Ten years? Nobody knows). And what exactly is causing the Bell's Palsy, and how is that cause going to interact with people's predispositions to develop other neurological conditions as they get older? We also don't yet know about the costs and benefits beyond a very short timeline relative to not having it; is the immunity conferred amongst the population more or less effective than that which people are developing naturally as they come into contact with strains of the virus that are more infectious and less lethal? For that matter, how does does immunity for this virus even work, antibodies or T-cells? If we're in a position where we understand this virus enough to be rolling out mass vaccination in a responsible way, why are we relying on flawed PCR testing (especially in terms of the elevated numbers of cycles) to track cases and justify the rushed deployment of vaccines, especially in the case of this highly experimental (albeit exciting) one? These are all questions that I would expect the regulatory authorities to have answered definitively and to be broadcasting widely before any widespread program of vaccination. Especially seeing as the manufacturers have been released from liability from the vaccines' effects.