Unfortunately I don’t think it will change a thing.
There are a significant number of people just fearful of the alleged “haste” in developing this vaccine. But for a great many, this has become a way to express political affiliation. I will never forgive the ones responsible for that.
And the other side will just quote doctors who are anti-vax. Throughout the pandemic, there were always doctors who went against the prevailing public health opinion.
In my area, the School Board relied on area pediatricians instead of the public health director. The peds insisted that kids don’t spread covid, don’t get sick, etc. My area was high community transmission, yet these peds insisted (using dated information!) that there was no danger of transmission in schools.
These peds were part of a children’s hospital. I will never look at that hospital the same again. And won’t be donating to them “for the children.”
I brought this variant up with my sister and unfortunately her response showed that she views the reporting on it is a scare tactic. I am revising my judgment on how likely she will be to eventually get vaccinated. 
One question for this crowd. Here and in other places I have heard delta may cause more severe illness in young people, but I haven’t been able to find any data to support this. Does anyone know if there is data on delta’s severity?
We had just started talking about relaxing our mask usage but nope, not yet…
I told H over the weekend, that it would not surprise me if we wound up like Missouri late this summer/fall. We do not have the Delta variant here yet, as reported by the health department over the weekend. That is not surprising, as we didn’t have many cases of covid until last summer. We are an hour from the nearest interstate, have no airport, no mass transit. Our area is also low density. Our stores aren’t crowded. Our restaurants are a different story, but it shouldn’t spread easily. What got us was the annual pilgrimage to the Myrtle Beach/Carolina beaches for summer vacation. Then everyone went to church and out to eat. The time has come again and I’m sure someone will bring it back. We aren’t as low as some places, but only 35% of the population (42-45% of the adult population) has been vaccinated. I am glad my family is taken care of.
My companies vaccine rate shot up ( pun unintended) as soon as they announced the rules. Vaccinated. No rules.
Unvaxxed. Mask at all times unless eating or drinking. Must eat in room for the unvaxxed. Drinks must be quick up and down with mask. No coming to the firm wide free lunch.
You are spot on L-G, but since covid hospitalizations and deaths are heavily skewed to the 60+ age group, in contrast to mostly asymptomatic in the 20-somethings, the ‘death’ toll, and ‘very sick’ toll will be much less impactful than it was earlier this year. (The 60+ crowd is approaching high vax rates; 39 states are already at 80%+ for 65 and over; OTOH, many seniors primarily in the south have made the conscious decision to play the covid lottery).
Thank you @MaineLonghorn for posting that dr.'s comments. They were spot on.
Please don’t think I am a terrible person, but after reading that, I have decided that I just don’t care anymore if anyone who doesn’t get the vaccine without a good reason gets sick and dies. I just don’t care. Supposedly smart people that I know have decided that they want 100% certainty about the vaccine before they get it. Fine, go ahead and wait, I don’t care.
I don’t care that a very intelligent friend who is a nurse answers “what vaccine” when asked if she had gotten it. Her husband is a type 1 diabetic. She is the type of person that, if anything bad is going to happen, it will happen to her. I don’t care if they get it.
I don’t care if my SIL who won’t get any flu or shingles or pneumonia or COVID vaccine gets anything. I don’t care if her son, who calls masks “face diapers”, gets sick. I just am tired of caring anymore.
I have 2 friends who have violent reactions to vaccines not get the vaccine. I care about them, because they can’t get it. Otherwise, I just don’t care.
I know what you mean, @silverlady. I do struggle with anger, though, when my friends in South Africa tell me they are back to lots of restrictions since people there can’t get vaccinated. Compare US stats to South Africa or Lebanon (the two countries I’m familiar with) and then tell me why you aren’t getting vaccinated? The variant is hitting young people harder, so I don’t buy the excuse, “I’m young and I won’t be affected…”
cttc - i was thinking about this all. I don’t necessarily agree completely with your local childrens docs; but i also think they had a small point.
if CV had hit with the mortality rate the 0-15 yr olds with the same way it hit the 75-90 yr olds – I think our country would be completely different right now. I think vax rates would be sky high; and we’d still be shut down to protect our youth. We’d be doing anything and everything to protect small children.
i am midwest - around families with young kids who all went to school/preschool, and so few of them worried about covid spread for their kids. We are just so thankful our kids could be in school this year. I know a few HS kids who had CV; but can’t think of any grade school or younger ones within our circle/coummunity. (i do know kids can get it though).
It gives me chills to think how horrid it would be if CV was rampant among youth . . . and that makes me feel a little guilty considering i have 4 parents/inlaws ages 79-90 (who are all vax’d and we were quite careful around this past year).
right or wrong, I think it’s my natural instinct to protect youth over elderly, as dismal as that may sound. And thank God the youth have emerged relatively unscathed through this.
Its interesting that you say this. When I was driving my dad to his vaccine (he is in his late 80s) he asked a couple times why he was getting one and not his grandkids.
Probably lots of people think that now that playing COVID-19 lottery is now mostly a voluntary personal choice, due to the option of vaccination that allows mostly opting-out of the COVID-19 lottery.
However, people like your two friends who cannot get vaccinated for medical reasons are among the few remaining people for whom playing COVID-19 lottery is much less voluntary in some situations. For example, if they need attention from nurses in a hospital, they can only hope that they nurses they get are not your unvaccinated nurse friend. Hence the arguments about COVID-19 vaccination requirements, or increased COVID-19 restrictions for the unvaccinated, in places like colleges and workplaces.
This has very quickly become a very preventable disease. Cases are now skewed toward the young, non-vaxxed, with the variants becoming more common as a result.
While numbers are way down in many states, they are climbing quickly in Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, and Missouri. Health officials there are very worried about another fall surge in those states.
I was reading an article (I don’t remember where, maybe NYT?) about how we are going to see two pandemic patterns in the USA. Places like VT, MA, and likely the heavily populated areas of places like IL or CA, etc., which will not see many cases of COVID, since their vaccination rates are high enough that they really will have herd immunity, even against the Delta variant. On the other hand, we will have states like MS, AK, where the pandemic will now run rampant (like is happening in MS). In other states, like FL, TX, OH, NM, CO, etc, we’ll see a checkerboard of low vaccinated counties and areas with high COVID rates, and areas with high vaccination rates with few or no cases.
Because the Delta variant seems to infect younger people at higher rates, we may see outbreaks in areas with high vaccination rates, but, as @bluebayou states, hospitalization rates and death rates will be much lower there, because it’s a younger population. Moreover, many of the high vaccination areas have better healthcare (though not all), and so will have better treatment.
Sure, they are heavily skewed towards the elderly—for now. The virus mutates.
Here in MA, a highly vaccinated state, we are seeing teenagers running to get the vaccine—they want to have a normal school year in September. Almost every college is requiring students to be vaccinated if they want to return in the fall. Since the mRNA vaccines take 6 weeks to reach full immunity, they’d better get started!
I’m wondering the same thing. It’s been reported that children and young people are more likely to get infected because it’s 60% more transmissible and they remain the largest age group of unvaccinated (in part because the youngest - ages 5-12 - aren’t even eligible). And so those children with co-morbidities are at higher risk for symptomatic Covid, hospitalization and death. But that fact doesn’t seem to be moving the needle in terms of vaccine approval for 5-12, and while Delta’s presence is growing here in the US, I haven’t seen data suggesting that hospitalizations are skewing younger. Maybe it’s too soon.
Unfortunately, the number of covid infections in under 12s has no impact on the clinical development process. Pfizer expects to have readouts of the clinical trials of 2-11 age groups in September, and if warranted, will seek EUA approval at that point. Pfizer has to follow the Phase 3 trial protocols and timelines, regardless of what is happening with infection rates and variants. I am not sure that status of clinical trials in under 18 age groups for Moderna, JNJ, or Novavax vaccines.
I don’t keep a history of my local area’s daily hospitalizations/deaths per age group, but I do update the total on my spreadsheet each day. I can tell that while the number of new hospitalizations/deaths are down significantly, when we do have new hospitalizations/deaths, they are likely to be evenly spread throughout 30s-60s age groups. I couldn’t give you any exact stats, though we did have our first hospitalization in the 0-9 age group last week.
Living in Colorado, we are now seeing the Delta variant explode and it is expected to easily be the dominant variant within a few weeks. As of a few days ago, I believe it made up 40% of new cases. The Denver metro area and the larger ski counties (Summit County, etc.) are highly vaccinated, but there are many places in Colorado where the vaccination rate is very, very low. Honestly, I’m kind of pissed off that my and my family’s protection is now lower than it was before.
Or, maybe it’s a non-event.