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COVID19 - To Vaccinate or To Not Vaccinate
Replies
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I agree @kimny72 - "This Week in Virology" is a great podcast. It got me through 2020!
I also agree that humans tend to look for things to explain the unknown.
Unfortunately, my initial post has been (as expected) misunderstood. Perhaps my wording wasn't quite right and I forgot that on the internet you can type a paragraph and have a sentence quoted (out of context). I deleted social media five years ago so I am a bit rusty.
I wanted to open up the discussion of what I have been hearing from many women this year in regards to (possible) longterm effects from the vax. I saw this thread and thought "maybe these folks know more about it." My post was out of curiosity. I asked questions. I now understand that this is not the place to get the answers. Many people are here to argue and this is the space to do it. I didn't realize this was the debate forum and I clearly don't have the proper evidence to back up my personal opinions.
I am admittedly scared of random illnesses/deaths so I tend to be worrisome when it comes to things like this. I lost my father to Pancreatic Cancer last year & my only brother battled Hodgkins Lymphoma for ten years. I grew up around terminal illness. I have seen what great things modern medicine can do but I am allowed to have concerns for something that was created in less than a year.
I am 29/married and would like to start a family soon. Many women like myself are just looking for closure and more info before moving forward. I now understand that this curiosity offends many of you, so I will just take my concerns elsewhere and continue to use this site for meal tracking. I just don't have the energy to argue on a fitness website.
Anyway, I hope everyone does what is best for them personally and stops worrying about the next guy. Life is too short. Happy St. Patrick's Day! xo
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Kermit, people answered your questions with references to actual scientific information.
You are getting all offended, why? Because what you said was shown to have no basis in fact?
Because we didn't share your concerns or validate your opinions?
I would like a link to who these Australian virologists are too - you say there are many.
I work in field of vaccination, in Australia, including soon to be Covid vaccinating and haven't heard any concerns about fertility.
Not vaccinating pregnant women, yes - not because it is likely to be harmful, it isn't - but because in our current Australian setting of very low community transmission and lack of data re pregnant women, we are cautiously suggesting they wait.
Re Gardisil - this has been on the funded school program for teenage girls since 2006 ( as well as for teenage boys for about 5 years),.
Given the vast majority women up to age 38 (ie who were 13 in 2006 onwards) and that's not even counting women who had a funded catch up window for a few years nor people who paid for it as a private vaccine, had Gardisil ..... would be massively surprising if none of those women had fertility issues.
Not because of Gardisil ( or using sunscreen or starting school at age 5 or having hair cuts or using the metric system or any other commonality) but because fertility issues are not unusual so of course some people will experience them15 -
and I clearly don't have the proper evidence to back up my personal opinions.
On this point, I do agree with you.
Clearly you don't.14 -
I understand that this curiosity offends many of you, so I will just take my concerns elsewhere and continue to use this site for meal tracking. I just don't have the energy to argue on a fitness
I think you understand wrong.
Curiosity does not offend many of us.
Making sweeping statements not based on facts does.
You had the energy to write a long post about being upset though.
Anyway if you are taking your concerns elsewhere please take them to places which give information based on credible factual sources- not to the type of anti vax sites you linked to earlier.
I am presuming you do want factual answers, not validation of personal opinions though.15 -
I agree @kimny72 - "This Week in Virology" is a great podcast. It got me through 2020! I also agree that humans tend to look for things to explain the unknown.
Unfortunately, my initial post has been (as expected) misunderstood. Perhaps my wording wasn't quite right and I forgot that on the internet you can type a paragraph and have a sentence quoted (out of context). I deleted social media five years ago so I am a bit rusty.
I wanted to open up the discussion of what I have been hearing from many women this year in regards to (possible) longterm effects from the vax. I saw this thread and thought "maybe these folks know more about it." My post was out of curiosity. I asked questions. I now understand that this is not the place to get the answers. Many people are here to argue and this is the space to do it. I didn't realize this was the debate forum and I clearly don't have the proper evidence to back up my personal opinions.
I am admittedly scared of random illnesses/deaths so I tend to be worrisome when it comes to things like this. I lost my father to Pancreatic Cancer last year & my only brother battled Hodgkins Lymphoma for ten years. I grew up around terminal illness. I have seen what great things modern medicine can do but I am allowed to have concerns for something that was created in less than a year.
I am 29/married and would like to start a family soon. Many women like myself are just looking for closure and more info before moving forward. I now understand that this curiosity offends many of you, so I will just take my concerns elsewhere and continue to use this site for meal tracking. I just don't have the energy to argue on a fitness website.
Anyway, I hope everyone does what is best for them personally and stops worrying about the next guy. Life is too short. Happy St. Patrick's Day! xo
Who are these many women and where are they getting this, since there’s no scientific basis for believing the vaccine has any connection to fertility?
Look, at the moment science is literally under attack by evil agents from hostile nations. That’s not a conspiracy theory, it’s a fact, people are being paid to spread misinformation. So when you come on here repeating that same misinformation it’s not just a polite difference of opinion, it’s you (hopefully unwittingly) acting against the public interest. Your words have the potential to do real harm, that’s why enemy governments were willing to pay money to put those words out there in the first place!
Here in West Tennessee, anti-vax sentiment is so high that currently 80% of vaccine appointments are going unused. That means herd immunity can never happen, and that means the virus will keep on evolving new variants which have a chance of outwitting the vaccine. That means those of us who did the right thing will die anyway, because the vaccine will stop working.
Seriously, don’t be that person. You are surely smart enough that if you had real questions about the dangers of the vaccine you could look up actual science and not ask questions on a random weight loss forum. You claim to be innocently interested in learning more, but your actions belie your words. What you are actually doing is sowing the seeds of misinformation in a space which has nothing to do with the subject.19 -
I agree @kimny72 - "This Week in Virology" is a great podcast. It got me through 2020! I also agree that humans tend to look for things to explain the unknown.
Unfortunately, my initial post has been (as expected) misunderstood. Perhaps my wording wasn't quite right and I forgot that on the internet you can type a paragraph and have a sentence quoted (out of context). I deleted social media five years ago so I am a bit rusty.
I wanted to open up the discussion of what I have been hearing from many women this year in regards to (possible) longterm effects from the vax. I saw this thread and thought "maybe these folks know more about it." My post was out of curiosity. I asked questions. I now understand that this is not the place to get the answers. Many people are here to argue and this is the space to do it. I didn't realize this was the debate forum and I clearly don't have the proper evidence to back up my personal opinions.
I am admittedly scared of random illnesses/deaths so I tend to be worrisome when it comes to things like this. I lost my father to Pancreatic Cancer last year & my only brother battled Hodgkins Lymphoma for ten years. I grew up around terminal illness. I have seen what great things modern medicine can do but I am allowed to have concerns for something that was created in less than a year.
I am 29/married and would like to start a family soon. Many women like myself are just looking for closure and more info before moving forward. I now understand that this curiosity offends many of you, so I will just take my concerns elsewhere and continue to use this site for meal tracking. I just don't have the energy to argue on a fitness website.
Anyway, I hope everyone does what is best for them personally and stops worrying about the next guy. Life is too short. Happy St. Patrick's Day! xo
I think everyone tried to respond to your post honestly and were respectful. The Gardisil issue has been wholly debunked, and people were telling you that to allay your fears and make sure other readers didn't fall into the same trap.
The fact that "a lot of women you talk to think something" is tough to debate, because you don't seem willing to point us to "why". You mentioned Australian virologists who support this idea, but as I said I can't find any evidence of that. So I'm not sure what you want us to say.
I am not even remotely concerned the covid vaccine will cause infertility. There's nothing in it that there is any reason to think would cause that, and female doctors, researchers, and public health officials vouch for it. And I am incurably curious, it's why I spend hours listening to TWIV and looking up the terms I don't know. It's why I googled after reading your post looking for data. I couldn't find any.
I do know people who don't "trust" the covid vaccine. When I ask for data, they point me to Facebook memes and blatantly anti vaxx conspiracy sites.
I guess you aren't going to point me to any sources. Rather than look for energy to argue, I hope maybe you go back and really read the replies, and challenge these women you know to question the sources they are trusting and really weigh the pros and cons. If too many people choose not to get vaxxed, none of us will ever be safe. If the "next guy" is not vaxxed and is cooking up a mutation while infected, I sure as heck am going to worry about it.10 -
As to the concern that the vaccines were created so quickly... The long timeline typical for vaccine development isn't spent creating the vaccine, it's spent getting money and permissions to conduct trials and ramp up production. Most of the years involved are spent applying for and waiting for grants, and applying for and waiting for authorizations. Because the entire world was on hold, money was thrown at any research and trials immediately, and requests for permissions were moved to the front of the line. The corners cut were mostly bureaucratic, though the trial times were shortened a little.
The technology and ingredients in the mRNA vaccines have been worked on for years, they were just waiting for someone with deep pockets willing to pay for the final steps. And the J&J vaccine is basically the ebola vaccine they have been administering for a decade, with the virus protein (I think I'm using the right term there) switched out. Both are the culmination of years of work, not hastily thrown together experiments.17 -
@kimny72 thanks for educating me that mRNA vaccines are a new approach to vaccines. Maybe my head was in the sand but I didn't realize that aspect of this issue. I guess after I already recovered from COVID, I hadn't really followed this aspect of the crisis.
For others interested, I just found this article/paper that goes into some detail on the benefits of the mRNA approach
mRNA vaccines — a new era in vaccinology5 -
As to the concern that the vaccines were created so quickly... The long timeline typical for vaccine development isn't spent creating the vaccine, it's spent getting money and permissions to conduct trials and ramp up production. Most of the years involved are spent applying for and waiting for grants, and applying for and waiting for authorizations. Because the entire world was on hold, money was thrown at any research and trials immediately, and requests for permissions were moved to the front of the line. The corners cut were mostly bureaucratic, though the trial times were shortened a little.
I always explain it as follow:
"If you get to a garage to have your car fixed by 1 mechanic that needs to order supplies, get approval of his boss etc, or you have your car fixed by a whole team of Formula 1 mecanics with all resources immediatly available, which will take longer?"
Same with the vaccine, because so many people working on it simultaniously, and the waiting time for authorizations was cut out of the proces they were able to create a vaccine so much faster.
They normally wouldn't do that for a vaccine, but because of a pandemic, they worked together.9 -
It really surprises me how adamant people are about something they haven't even taken the time to research and/or learn about. Talking to friends or believing your facebook feed is never a good educational approach in something this complicated.
I am super surprised for instance that @Theo166 didn't have the basic understanding of the mRNA vaccine technology until yesterday. This thing (Covid) has stopped the world in its tracks and will affect the world's economy (i.e. YOU) for the next ten years minimum ....and people haven't taken an hour or so of their past year's isolation to learn about this vaccine? It's mind-boggling to me.
As far as the HPV vac, at least you have to have sex to catch it so there is some personal control. The SARS virus(es) are way too easily transmitted for us to be safe without a majority being vaccinated.
The anti-vaxx crap sadly doesn't surprise me even though I think it's a very dangerous stance - for all of us. I mean, people believe all kinds of scary stuff. Or are they just trolling us in a long game?
My uncle used to say, "Well, it will thin the herd."
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I agree @kimny72 - "This Week in Virology" is a great podcast. It got me through 2020! I also agree that humans tend to look for things to explain the unknown.
Unfortunately, my initial post has been (as expected) misunderstood. Perhaps my wording wasn't quite right and I forgot that on the internet you can type a paragraph and have a sentence quoted (out of context). I deleted social media five years ago so I am a bit rusty.
I wanted to open up the discussion of what I have been hearing from many women this year in regards to (possible) longterm effects from the vax. I saw this thread and thought "maybe these folks know more about it." My post was out of curiosity. I asked questions. I now understand that this is not the place to get the answers. Many people are here to argue and this is the space to do it. I didn't realize this was the debate forum and I clearly don't have the proper evidence to back up my personal opinions.
I am admittedly scared of random illnesses/deaths so I tend to be worrisome when it comes to things like this. I lost my father to Pancreatic Cancer last year & my only brother battled Hodgkins Lymphoma for ten years. I grew up around terminal illness. I have seen what great things modern medicine can do but I am allowed to have concerns for something that was created in less than a year.
I am 29/married and would like to start a family soon. Many women like myself are just looking for closure and more info before moving forward. I now understand that this curiosity offends many of you, so I will just take my concerns elsewhere and continue to use this site for meal tracking. I just don't have the energy to argue on a fitness website.
Anyway, I hope everyone does what is best for them personally and stops worrying about the next guy. Life is too short. Happy St. Patrick's Day! xo
Which is exactly what happened. My initial response to your post was curiosity, so I looked into it, posted what I found out, and that seems to have upset you somehow? I am too old to be worried about fertility, but the young people in my life had the Gardasil vaccine so it piqued my curiosity. But conversation goes two ways - I asked you to clarify what exactly brought you to the belief it was the Gardasil vaccine and not something else that caused your friends infertility. No response. It is hard to have a conversation that way.
I know where the infertility fears came from, there were reports a few months back about a connection between the spike protein in the vaccine and some sort of protein (?? - not sure exactly how this works) involved in the producing the placenta. From what I have been able to find out it has been debunked, and theoretically contracting COVID would produce the same spike proteins, so if that is the case we would be in for a massive infertility epidemic anyway. I'm not super confident I understand the whole thing completely so maybe someone else can weight in with specifics.
FWIW if you are hesitant to get the vaccine and the research people present you with doesn't calm your nerves I think it is perfectly appropriate given your age and risk status to wait to get it if and when you feel more comfortable. I understand health anxiety, I went through many years of (sometimes irrational) health fears and it is a real thing. The young people in my family all enjoy travelling too much to wait, so they are going ahead with it when their turns come.
If it makes you feel any better I looked into it last night a bit more and during the clinical trials pregnant women were excluded but there were 23 pregnancies that occurred during the trial, 11 in the placebo group and 12 in the vaccine group - so that might be reassuring to you. (I'll try to find the actual study on this.)
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I am a nurse and received the vaccine last week.
To say I was not hesitant would be a lie. Many nurses in my department has similar concerns. Luckily we were assured that all was well, but not everyone has access to medical journals like we do.
Most people just have Google, which we all know can be dangerous. People forget how powerful online articles and word-of-mouth can be. I have had several women recently inquire about the vaccine in regards to fertility. Many have declined it for now. This is an ongoing issue.
While most claims continue to be debunked, you really cannot blame young people for thinking twice.
This is coming from someone who fully supports the Covid-19 vaccine.
I believe @kermit124 was attempting to address claims that they heard, which is a quality I see in many patients. I feel like they are being brought down for having these concerns, which is equally ineffective.
The rumors with Gardasil are still ongoing for their demographic. Once the word got out that there "could be a link between the HPV vaccine and fertility" it spread like wildfire. I believe @kermit124 was laying out those articles to show which information their generation has been receiving. I have seen one of those articles shared on Instagram recently. I hate to say it, but it is true. They are really being told that they might not be able to have children. I don't think reprimanding them for their concerns is productive, but I also am used to hearing this.
Allow room for this conversation to happen since many of you may be hearing similar thoughts from your young loved ones looking to conceive.
It's a tough time in this world of over-information to sift out fact and fiction. Let's work together with grace!!!
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@kimny72 thanks for educating me that mRNA vaccines are a new approach to vaccines. Maybe my head was in the sand but I didn't realize that aspect of this issue. I guess after I already recovered from COVID, I hadn't really followed this aspect of the crisis.
For others interested, I just found this article/paper that goes into some detail on the benefits of the mRNA approach
mRNA vaccines — a new era in vaccinology
It's really fascinating stuff, even to someone like me who doesn't know a lot of the scientific terminology! The beauty of it seems to be that you use the same base for everything, and then just "plug in" the blueprint for whatever virus part you want manufactured. And you could put multiple blueprints in one shot, streamlining vaccinations. There is also talk that it theoretically could be used in cancer treatment, but I believe that is more aspirational, and I'm not really clear on how it would work
3 -
healthyhannah__ wrote: »I am a nurse and received the vaccine last week.
To say I was not hesitant would be a lie. Many nurses in my department has similar concerns. Luckily we were assured that all was well, but not everyone has access to medical journals like we do.
Most people just have Google, which we all know can be dangerous. People forget how powerful online articles and word-of-mouth can be. I have had several women recently inquire about the vaccine in regards to fertility. Many have declined it for now. This is an ongoing issue.
While most claims continue to be debunked, you really cannot blame young people for thinking twice.
This is coming from someone who fully supports the Covid-19 vaccine.
I believe @kermit124 was attempting to address claims that they heard, which is a quality I see in many patients. I feel like they are being brought down for having these concerns, which is equally ineffective.
The rumors with Gardasil are still ongoing for their demographic. Once the word got out that there "could be a link between the HPV vaccine and fertility" it spread like wildfire. I believe @kermit124 was laying out those articles to show which information their generation has been receiving. I have seen one of those articles shared on Instagram recently. I hate to say it, but it is true. They are really being told that they might not be able to have children. I don't think reprimanding them for their concerns is productive, but I also am used to hearing this.
Allow room for this conversation to happen since many of you may be hearing similar thoughts from your young loved ones looking to conceive.
It's a tough time in this world of over-information to sift out fact and fiction. Let's work together with grace!!!
I'm not sure what you mean by "allow room for this conversation to happen." The conversation WAS happening. People responded to the inaccurate information with accurate information. Allowing a conversation to happen doesn't require validating fears that are not grounded in reality. In instances where there is no information to support a particular set of claims, that can and should be pointed out.
I don't think anyone is denying that anti-vax information isn't out there and it isn't causing some people to avoid medical treatments that will save lives. We obviously know it is out there and we know that people are being harmed by it. It's obvious that people are being told stuff like this.16 -
janejellyroll wrote: »healthyhannah__ wrote: »
I'm not sure what you mean by "allow room for this conversation to happen." The conversation WAS happening. People responded to the inaccurate information with accurate information. Allowing a conversation to happen doesn't require validating fears that are not grounded in reality. In instances where there is no information to support a particular set of claims, that can and should be pointed out.
I don't think anyone is denying that anti-vax information isn't out there and it isn't causing some people to avoid medical treatments that will save lives. We obviously know it is out there and we know that people are being harmed by it. It's obvious that people are being told stuff like this.
I just skimmed the thread and from the replies I thought Kermit was telling people to not get the vaccine. I found their original post and realized that was not the case at all. They laid out their concern, tied it to Gardisil claims (risky) and pasted 3 sites as an example of where the claims came from. This is common among young people.
Many could argue that the "accurate information" being provided in this thread is not accurate at all. That is the world we live in. Everyone has opinions and you can find dozens of articles to back up your claim, regardless of its accuracy.
I have dealt with dozens of straight-up anti-vaxxers. I didn't catch this drift from this Kermit person. Concern and claims are two different things. I didn't see any claims. This seems like a "don't shoot the messenger" situation in my opinion.
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healthyhannah__ wrote: »janejellyroll wrote: »healthyhannah__ wrote: »
I'm not sure what you mean by "allow room for this conversation to happen." The conversation WAS happening. People responded to the inaccurate information with accurate information. Allowing a conversation to happen doesn't require validating fears that are not grounded in reality. In instances where there is no information to support a particular set of claims, that can and should be pointed out.
I don't think anyone is denying that anti-vax information isn't out there and it isn't causing some people to avoid medical treatments that will save lives. We obviously know it is out there and we know that people are being harmed by it. It's obvious that people are being told stuff like this.
I just skimmed the thread and from the replies I thought Kermit was telling people to not get the vaccine. I found their original post and realized that was not the case at all. They laid out their concern, tied it to Gardisil claims (risky) and pasted 3 sites as an example of where the claims came from. This is common among young people.
Many could argue that the "accurate information" being provided in this thread is not accurate at all. That is the world we live in. Everyone has opinions and you can find dozens of articles to back up your claim, regardless of its accuracy.
I have dealt with dozens of straight-up anti-vaxxers. I didn't catch this drift from this Kermit person. Concern and claims are two different things. I didn't see any claims. This seems like a "don't shoot the messenger" situation in my opinion.
Once again - this is the DEBATE section of this site.
Perhaps read the sticky thread about the general outlines for this forum.
If someone makes a claim, we WILL refute it if it's fallacious. Please read entire threads before jumping in.13 -
I did lol I am not confused. I am fully aware that this is where debates take place.
Anyway, you seem tense. Perhaps a walk outdoors would be a good idea for you 5 -
healthyhannah__ wrote: »janejellyroll wrote: »healthyhannah__ wrote: »
I'm not sure what you mean by "allow room for this conversation to happen." The conversation WAS happening. People responded to the inaccurate information with accurate information. Allowing a conversation to happen doesn't require validating fears that are not grounded in reality. In instances where there is no information to support a particular set of claims, that can and should be pointed out.
I don't think anyone is denying that anti-vax information isn't out there and it isn't causing some people to avoid medical treatments that will save lives. We obviously know it is out there and we know that people are being harmed by it. It's obvious that people are being told stuff like this.
I just skimmed the thread and from the replies I thought Kermit was telling people to not get the vaccine. I found their original post and realized that was not the case at all. They laid out their concern, tied it to Gardisil claims (risky) and pasted 3 sites as an example of where the claims came from. This is common among young people.
Many could argue that the "accurate information" being provided in this thread is not accurate at all. That is the world we live in. Everyone has opinions and you can find dozens of articles to back up your claim, regardless of its accuracy.
I have dealt with dozens of straight-up anti-vaxxers. I didn't catch this drift from this Kermit person. Concern and claims are two different things. I didn't see any claims. This seems like a "don't shoot the messenger" situation in my opinion.
Many could argue that the earth is flat and post links to show why they believe it. Being abundantly clear that opinions and facts are different and holding firm to ways to vet sources is our only way out of this disinformation mess. If kermit would like to have a discussion on how to vet sources, I'm sure it would be a great conversation starter here as well.
Pointing out that what someone believes is untrue is not argumentative or unkind. Anyway, I'm not seeing what you're seeing in her posts. Taking offense at pushback as a lack of curiosity and unwillingness to have a discussion seems to me like someone who was looking for confirmation, not a conversation. Maybe the imperfection of reading text on a screen is causing misunderstandings too. But as others have said, this is the Debate forum. What she posted was objectively untrue, and that was rightly pointed out.12 -
cmriverside wrote: »It really surprises me how adamant people are about something they haven't even taken the time to research and/or learn about. Talking to friends or believing your facebook feed is never a good educational approach in something this complicated.
I am super surprised for instance that @Theo166 didn't have the basic understanding of the mRNA vaccine technology until yesterday. This thing (Covid) has stopped the world in its tracks and will affect the world's economy (i.e. YOU) for the next ten years minimum ....and people haven't taken an hour or so of their past year's isolation to learn about this vaccine? It's mind-boggling to me.
As far as the HPV vac, at least you have to have sex to catch it so there is some personal control. The SARS virus(es) are way too easily transmitted for us to be safe without a majority being vaccinated.
The anti-vaxx crap sadly doesn't surprise me even though I think it's a very dangerous stance - for all of us. I mean, people believe all kinds of scary stuff. Or are they just trolling us in a long game?
My uncle used to say, "Well, it will thin the herd."
I want to agree with your uncle. I really do. It would be great if the people who made irresponsible choices bore all the consequences while responsible people who did all in their power to mitigate risk bore none.
However, for reasons rheddmobile stated above, the irresponsible create conditions (virus reproduction) that directly result (virus mutation) in the vaccine becoming less effective for all the people who were responsible (avoiding spreading opportunities and getting the jab).
It's always a few irresponsible people who ruin it for everyone else who make an effort to be responsible.9 -
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