Coronavirus (COVID-19) Discussion Thread

[haxxiy]

SvennoJ said:

This does raise a moral/ethical question.

Do you let the virus do 'its thing', no more restrictions, since the option is there to get vaccinated if you want / try hard enough. Basically let the anti-vaxers and other hesitant people fend for themselves. (with the risk of creating new strains in the process) And go for herd immunity the hard way.

What about the children though, below 12 aren't getting vaccinated yet and while low occurrence, there are problems with covid in children as well. Plus hospitals will stay busy with covid, pushing other things further and further back.

I mean...

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jul/08/new-zealand-children-falling-ill-in-high-numbers-due-to-covid-immunity-debt

https://www.insider.com/rsv-respiratory-virus-is-infecting-children-across-the-south-2021-6

I understand the concern, but it isn't even the most dangerous virus to routinely affect children. Not even close.

I mean, we don't know even if the vaccines will be approved to them. And if they were, is vaccinating children really justifiable when billions of at-risk groups don't have a single dose yet, and we aren't as obsessed about much greater threats to their health?

EricHiggin said: The vax doesn't make every last person 100% immune. How do we know this possible, much deadlier mutation, won't come from someone who is already vaxed with their defenses supposedly prepared? Most of the time you don't bother upping your game much unless it becomes necessity, due to efficiency.

Possible, yes, who knows. Just like it's possible H1N1 becomes like the 1918 strain again. Or adenovirus serotype 14 becomes much more transmissible etc. Is it worth spending time thinking about it, though? We do have emerging evidence, at least, that the virus mutates much less in vaccinated people.

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.01.21259833v1

And it can't respond to evolutionary pressure if it doesn't have the time to mutate.