My mother is 99, frail and has a history of adverse reactions to vaccines. She worked as a Registered Nurse from the 1940s to the 1980s and had to retire due to work injuries.
And then there are a large number of people that can't be vaccinated.
They are called children.
Excluding children under 12 who are not yet FDA authorized to receive the vaccine, there are actually very few people who have medical contraindications to vaccines. Children are typically the last to get approval for new pharmaceuticals for obvious ethical reasons. It also makes sense considering they are at the lowest risk. I would be very surprised if the vaccine is not approved in children eventually.
1. Unlike a lot of other vaccines, especially historically, the vaccines don’t contain latex, egg, pork, etc. The vaccines have excipients that people can have allergies to, polyethylene glycol or polysorbate, but this is rare, especially compared to the aforementioned substances.
2. There is no live virus in the COVID vaccine so immunocompromised patients aren’t at risk of the vaccine causing an infection. It’s possible that the vaccine could cause immune function to drop further, but this has yet to be observed. The current protocol is vaccinate the immunocompromised because the risk of active infection is far more serious.
3. People with autoimmune disorders may be at risk of an autoimmune reaction from the vaccine. Again, there has been no observed association. Generally speaking those with autoimmune disorders or histories of autoimmune reactions will be recommended to get the vaccine.
4. Like most new drugs (and many older drugs), the effect on mother’s and their fetus or breastfed children is unknown (it’s not really ethical to test for toxicity in babies). Current protocol recommends pregnant/breastfeeding women get the vaccine.
The one population where there is concern is someone has numerous drug allergies. The more allergies (especially of unrelated substances) someone has, the more likely they are to develop allergic reactions to new substances. In such a situation that’s a decision to assess with one’s medical team. For someone like your mother I think it would be worth reviewing what vaccines she responded to poorly and see if there’s a common denominator between them. It’s also worth noting a surprising amount of people don’t understand the difference between side effects and allergic reactions. If there’s no trend, then it would probably be advisable to to not get the vaccine, especially in a 99 year old. On the other hand, patients are monitored after receiving the vaccine and allergic reactions can be easily managed - it really depends on the patients health status, risk factors, and what they’re comfortable with.
Cape Cod/Provincetown shows otherwise. That is the point you keep forgetting when you bring up this talking point.
Per 10Boston local news, out of a cluster of almost 900 people; "Seven people have been hospitalized in connection with this cluster -- five from Massachusetts and two from out of state -- and no deaths have been reported." So, it seems like this is a case were the vaccines worked to prevent serious illness or death.
We will need to learn more about this cluster as it relates to the number of infections. I would be very cautions about drawing general conclusions from a single event. There are numerous ways these cluster outliers can be misleading. And it is an outlier, since nationally the vast majority of new infections and people in the hospital/deaths are unvaccinated.
Personally, I am hesitant to draw any major conclusions from the Provincetown cluster. As it is, the studies looking at the vaccine efficacy vs. the delta variant are highly variable. For example, there are have studies out of the UK suggesting ~80%, while Israel is saying 39%. That’s a huge difference. It’s very possible there are flaws in these studies. Israel hasn’t released any data at all, so there’s no way to make an assessment. Other data I’ve seen reported is based off incredibly small population sizes, as little as a 200-300 people.
An important consideration is who are getting these breakthrough cases? People with reduced immune function for whatever reason (unmanaged HIV, old age, Chemo, immune suppressant drugs, etc) are likely to form less immunity than someone with a healthy immune system.
The Provincetown data has garnered a lot of attention, especially here in Massachusetts. There is a lack of specific data and context though. Initially the CDC reported 469 breakthrough cases and 74% being in fully vaccinated individuals (now 880 cases, not sure what the %vax’ed is).
First, one thing to consider is that the vax rate in P-Town is extremely high- 114% (more people vaccinated listing their address in P-town than the last census population indicated live there). Only about 3,000 people live there year round, but in the summer the population is as high as 60,000. The 4th of July weekend is the busiest weekend for any coastal tourist destinations in New England.
Provincetown is also an extremely liberal place and is known for being a Mecca of sorts for the LGBT community. I would expect high vaccination rates among visitors. If you estimate 651 breakthrough (0.75x880) cases out of 60,000 people, that’s like 1%.
The LGBT community, which is overly represented in P-town, may also have some factors that skew the stats on the vaccine efficacy and transmission rates (specifically the MSM cohort). For example men who have sex with other men are at significantly higher risk of HIV, which reduces immune function, reducing immune response to vaccines. 15% of HIV+ people don’t know they’re infected and less than 50% of infected people have their viral load managed. Gay men may be more sexually promiscuous. More intimate contact means higher risk of transmission. This is not to stereotype the LGBT community or cast judgement. It’s just factors that should be considered when comparing different groups.
It’s also worth noting the delta variant has not been confirmed in the P-town cluster, it has only been presumed as the likely cause. It’s possible some/many/all of these cases are a different strain or a new strain.
Anyways, the good news is if you’re vaccinated the chances of requiring hospitalization is incredibly low. It’s just concerning that if breakthrough cases are occurring in tbe vaccinated, the possibility of a vaccine resistant strain increases. And no one is talking about that.
