I haven’t ignored it… You covered the risk assessment with or without the vaccine. Noted. I’ve repeatedly stressed how the risks for young people and young adults aren’t alarming either way, although the vaccine purely from a corona perspective obviously is better than none regardless of effectiveness. I maintain that the lack of long-term data on the vaccines is discomforting in conjunction with the way in which mass vaccinations have facilitated the emergence of extremely intrusive vaccine passport policies.
On those fronts it seems we’re at a stalemate where it’s time to accept disagreement. However, I don’t deny that herd immunity, or lack thereof, is an important factor in combatting critical mutations, but on that point you’ve already stated yourself how the delta variant is making this difficult to achieve even with the vaccines in play.
OK. You're welcome to have your opinion, however wrong most of us think it is, but any support of that opinion has to be factually correct.
Stating "
the risks for young people and young adults aren’t alarming either way" as a fact supporting your position isn't valid, it's at best a circular argument.
You might not find them alarming. That's subjective, not objective. I'd say a wide number of people are objectively very concerned about the effect COVID has on young adults (and teenagers) - from death (low risk), from hospitalisation (low to medium risk), from illness bad enough to take a long time to recover from (medium risk), from long COVID even after what may have been a mild illness (medium to high risk). None of those are to be taken lightly and dismissed easily; none can be called 'low severity'.
Good news? I wasn’t denying there is, but it’s naive to assume we are anywhere close to being done with the bad news.
Almost all of the 'bad news' articles recently are documenting more and more long-term side effects from COVID. Diabetes is one of the latest to add to the huge list. These greatly outweigh the admittedly not good news that herd immunity may not be possible with this round of vaccination (it is still an exaggeration to call that news 'bad', as it was expected that variants would have an even worse effect on efficacy, still is). But frankly the blame for that lies with COVID; the vaccine is still very safe and effective. In summary, the bulk of bad news is on the COVID risks side of the equation, it is incorrect to represent it otherwise, and wholly unsubstantiated to expect that pattern to change.
Blanket me with herd immunity? Not really something I would count on. Especially not when the disease is still circulating among vaccinated people. I’d be most grateful if people hold onto good habits like being attentive to hand hygiene. Too many people touch their own face at random without realizing they just grabbed a door handle thousands of other people also did that day.
When it looked feasible that we might reach herd immunity with less than full vaccination of adults, obviously there was an option to just hunker down for a while longer and wait for it to go away. But our scientists' outlook, by February if not before, was firmly settled that herd immunity would not eliminate COVID, and vaccines would only be our route from pandemic to endemic seasonal illness (like Flu). Anyone talking about a hope for actual herd immunity since then, including me, has been more optimist than realist. Still, the more immunity the better, in any circumstance - either by greater efficacy of vaccines, or by greater numbers vaccinated (or even by previous infection, although not as effective as vaccine and having to face whatever consequences the dice rolls).
HM Gov Report Feb 2021:
Transition from pandemic to endemic
194. Over time, scientists expect COVID-19 to become endemic, meaning the virus will reach a stable, and hopefully manageable level. It may have seasonal surges. Scientists do not yet know how or when that transition will occur.
195. Vaccines will be key to managing the transition from pandemic to endemic state. Therapeutics and antivirals will also be increasingly important and replace most non-pharmaceutical interventions over the long term.
As an airborne diease, hand and surface hygiene is far less important than was first thought. Masks, much more (it's quite shocking to look back and see how long it took for them to be recommended, let alone compulsory). I certainly can't see most vaccinated people thinking it worthwhile to be as conscientious as they have been (in either respect). Anecdotally, in the supermarkets I go to, these days it's the youngest (adults) that aren't wearing masks, young enough that they may well not have had their second dose yet. Overall far fewer people are bothering to wipe down their basket/trolley handle before shopping. And if there's a lull in cases, that will only make hygiene/masking even less common, and who knows if it would pick back up if case numbers increased again - I'd say not quickly enough.
