Vaccine reluctance & General COVID Discussion

The other thing, is if exposed Sat night, by Tuesday I could possibly have symptoms and would have to cancel. I could not also expose my co-workers to covid. That would be very bad optics.

Could you do it virtually if you were infected? I would go to the Saturday event because it sounds like it is important. I would try to be careful, but if you should get sick then adjust your work schedule. At some point we all need to live our lives.

My understanding is boosters reach full effectiveness much faster than the original series and start working at some level almost immediately. So, yes, a week earlier would have been ideal but youā€™re still likely ok.

2 Likes

Update from me. Co-workerā€™s Dad did test positive on a home test this morning. Telemed doctor gave him paxlovid and something for his cough.

But, it appears covid is already back in the office. Different co-worker stayed home Tuesday and Wednesday morning to take care of his wife (SAHM) and 2 kids. He came in Wednesday afternoon and is out today with a sore throat. Now we hear wife has covid. He just had to come in yesterday afternoon. Grumbleā€¦

Ok. Hereā€™s something I found fascinating. My friends husband works for our big cityā€™s health department and is also a public health researcher at a university. He and colleagues decided to do a study of those who had never had Covid. Over the last 8 weeks they got many participants. They tested them to rule out those who in fact had a ( likely asymptomatic) case of COVID. 99 percent showed that they had indeed had previously been infected. They couldnā€™t do the study.

9 Likes

Super interesting. And makes sense.

1 Like

That truly is interesting. The three adults in our household have not had Covid, to the best of our knowledge, despite one being a health-care worker, one working in a public school, and one commuting by bus (me). My daughter and I have had quite a few tests (before medical procedures, etc.), and I get called in every once in a while for a random test (part of a UW study). I would love us to have antibody testing, because it just doesnā€™t seem likely that we could have ducked the virus for more than two years.

1 Like

It would be nucleocapsid antibody testing to check for this, since spike antibody testing will show positive for infection or vaccination. Nucleocapsid antibodies will show only if you have been exposed to that part of the virus, which means the actual virus, or inactivated virus vaccines not used in the US.

2 Likes

Exactly. Thatā€™s the testing they did.

1 Like

There is some concern about vaccine providers confusing the older and new vaccine because the vial caps are the same color (Pfizer gray, Moderna blue). I am wondering if we should ask pharmacist or nurse to double check!

Yes! I posted the link to an article about this earlier (not sure if it was in this thread). This was brought up during last weekā€™s ACIP meeting several times, but it was pretty much brushed off. It is assumed that education/administration instructions will be good enough. I donā€™t feel that confident. I do NOT want the wrong vaccine when i get my booster.

Iā€™ll go and try to find an article about it. ETA Here is an article about it: Providers report dozens of errors giving Pfizer's COVID vaccine. Experts worry new boosters will fuel more

Canā€™t hurt to ask, but my understanding is many pharmacies have sent back or otherwise disposed of any of the old Pfizer and Moderna vaccines.

1 Like

Really? My understanding is that those are still used for the initial series of two shots. Itā€™s only boosters that are getting the new formulation. Id be surprised if pharmacies were disposing of them.

I know thatā€™s the CDC recommendation. Maybe some pharmacies are thinking unvaccinated peeps arenā€™t going to get vaccinated at this point, so why have the inventory (and possible confusion with new bivalents)?

Note that the old boosters are not supposed to be given to anyone now, so those should not be kept.

There will still be some people looking for initial vaccination:

  • Newly turned 18 with anti-vaccination parents.
  • New immigrants from places where vaccines were less available to them.
  • Children becoming newly eligible.
  • Vaccine hesitant people who became less hesitant for some reason (perhaps after seeing family or friend suffer from severe COVID-19).
1 Like

Agreed, but still relatively low demand for products with 6-9 months of shelf lifeā€¦some pharmacies wonā€™t want to deal with that, especially when they have to start paying for the vaccines.

Hereā€™s an article discussing how many likely to be unused vaccines are out there: New Covid vaccines are here. What happens to the original shots?

1 Like

Very interesting. Any idea how many people were tested? Neither my H nor I have ever had Covid. Iā€™ve wondered a long time if I already had it back in Feb 2020 before it was general knowledge.

With numbers that high I would be suspicious that the test was picking up exposure to all coronaviruses, not just SARS-CoV-2.

1 Like

Verified by nucleocapsid antibody testing?

1 Like

The pharmacist at our CVS said they donā€™t have any more of the old shot. They werenā€™t taking walk in appointments though so I bet they didnā€™t have much inventory to begin with.

1 Like