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I’m just going to say this. Those who think that because some folks died from the shot, it is somehow comparable to folks who have actually died from COVID-19 itself and thus not worth getting, truly do not understand how this works at all. Furthermore, herd immunity only applies here when 70-80% of the population is vaccinated. It has been covered and explained time and time again, by folks who actually believe and understand science, why herd immunization (as it was being suggested last year) is a bad option. The fact that millions more would have died would be the number one reason for it not happening. In the past year, my girlfriend and I have lost family (her non-mask wearing grandfather) and friends on both sides and a few who are still battling some crazy side effects of this disease. It is not the flu. It is not the cold. It is not even chickenpox. It is a disease with many different facets to it and we should all be doing our level best to keep it to a minimum.

@USA-1 your strong immune system could very well be your undoing if you were to catch Covid. Many of the young healthy people who died did so because their immune system over reacted and flooded their lungs with mucus and inflamed air passages too much in an attempt to fight the virus. You are correct that mRNA vaccines have not been widely used like this before, but they are not untested. The vaccine itself is out of your system within a few days of each shot, removed by your immune system. While using mRNA is a new technique for creating immune response, that’s where the novelty of it ends. Once your body recognizes it as an intruder, the immune process works the same as any other vaccine or even just being infected. And because the vaccine is expelled within days by the body, there is no reason to assume any long term side effects. Think of mRNA as the 3D Printing of the vaccine world. Once the composition of a virus’s spike protein is known, we now have the ability to isolate just the DNA that creates just that spike protein. With today’s technology, that means a vaccine can be developed for a specific virus within weeks to months instead of years. The implications of mRNA vaccines are huge. While we’ve all been talking about just COVID-19, scientists are already looking at using this technology for scores of other diseases such as cancer. This has been a breakthrough as big or bigger than antibiotics and we’re seeing the beginning of it. mRNA vaccines won’t work for all types of viruses, but it will work for a lot of common ones. I imagine in a few years once the focus on Covid has died down, there will be vaccines for the common cold. And because the technology is akin to 3D printing, the new vaccines will be relatively cheap to produce as well. The data so far shows that people who have been vaccinated have significantly higher antibody levels than those who got Covid, so even if you had it before you are not as well protected as someone who got their shots. The only people who died from the shot were either in extremely frail health and should not have been vaccinated in the first place or people who have severe allergic reactions to an unrelated ingredient in the vaccine. People who experience certain kinds of allergies are instructed not to get the Moderna or Pfizer shots. The J&J shot has a significantly lower rate of allergic reaction, but also lower protection from the virus. There are only 2 big question marks that will only be answered with time. 1. Will we need to get boosters to combat against variants? So far the data shows that while you may not be completely protected from a new variant, having the vaccine does prevent the illness from becoming serious enough to cause hospitalization and completely prevents death from the virus. So for now, getting the shots is worthwhile even with the variants out there. I will get the Moderna variants booster if/when it becomes available and needed. We have to do this with influenza every year, so it’s no big deal. 2. The other question mark is on how long immunity lasts. Most vaccines require booster shots after a period of years. The MMR vaccine is usually given to children, but for people my age and older they’re finding that the body forgets how to make the antibodies after a bunch of years for the vaccine that was being used in the early 80s when I got mine. There is a newer MMR shot that is supposed to improve on that which children are getting these days. I got a booster for MMR a couple years ago because I had the old vaccine. A few years ago I talked to my doctor and had him put me on a schedule to get boosters of anything and everything I might need because I was traveling internationally regularly. But the risk of the body forgetting how to make antibodies is present for nearly all vaccines, so while we do not have data yet on when boosters for Covid-19 might be needed, I’m just assuming they will be needed eventually in order to maintain immunity. I do hope you’ll reconsider and eventually get the shot USA.

Well, I've already eaten 4 deviled eggs, and there's 3 more trembling victims in the fridge that aren't likely to see the light of dawn. - - - - -

That's actually a lower rate than the article from Israel that I quoted, so I'm not sure why you think that helps your argument. And all it is saying is that the vaccine didn't protect everyone. We KNOW that. We knew it going into it. Vaccines rarely ever protect everyone and there is nearly always someone who is unable to take a vaccine for other health reasons. That is why it is so important for those of us who can take the vaccine to take the vaccine... to protect those who can't. That is the only ethical way we get to herd immunity. If 80% of people out there take the vaccine, this pandemic is over. By not taking it, you're only helping to extend it longer. Even if you had covid, you are not as protected from the virus or variants as you are if you took the vaccine.

I did... here's is a quote from one of them.... 271 out of 3,387,340 people got severely infected with Covid after being vaccinated (and we don't have any information on their underlying health conditions, so they could all be obese diabetics for all we know), and of those, 99 still died (but again, the article doesn't give info... did they die from Covid or were they already compromised in some way with severe co-morbities?) 0.2% of those vaccinated caught the virus, 2% of those people or 0.000029% of the total vaccinated, died. Only 0.00021% of those who were vaccinated caught covid and got serious illness. You don't get much more of a sure thing in risk management of any sort, in the world of vaccines, this is a grand slam hit out of the park success. By comparison, the Flu vaccine is between 40% and 60% effective depending on the strain in a given year. The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are ~95% effective. All numbers came from your article in the last link. I consider that one to be one of the best because Israel has by-far the highest Covid vaccination rate of any country, so I consider its data to be the most revealing.

My contribution to Easter Dinner. My entire pod is fully vaccinated now so we were able to gather for the first time in a year. Strawberry cheesecake, everything is homemade.

Please post the actual links of where you are getting these so called facts on people who are vaccinated are getting sick with Covid-19? Currently if you never had Covid-19 and get vaccinated, there has been no reported cases of infection except by deceptive news outlets that have not given any actual scientific facts on this. Myths and Facts about COVID-19 Vaccines | CDC Current data is showing that J&J effectiveness is only 66%. Information About Johnson & Johnson’s Janssen COVID-19 Vaccine | CDC What You Need to Know About the Johnson & Johnson Vaccine - COVID-19 - Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health (jhsph.edu) Plenty of factual real science data from John Hopkins on the facts, not myths or news slander on vaccination. Vaccines - Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center (jhu.edu) COVID-19 Vaccination Information and Updates (hopkinsmedicine.org) COVID-19 Vaccines: Myth Versus Fact | Johns Hopkins Medicine If you do not want to have any faith or trust in US based science, there is also Oxford University. Oxford coronavirus vaccine shows sustained protection of 76% during the 3-month interval until the second dose | University of Oxford COVID-19 vaccines | Vaccine Knowledge (ox.ac.uk) End result is I work with Oxford, JH and CDC daily since they use the storage product I support and I listen in on the daily concalls and the research and work being done. The vaccines are far safer than the Hyper Boll scare tactics used by news outlets, religion and other groups that hope to cause problems by fear. You have a higher chance of death not being vaccinated than you do being vaccinated. If you spend time reading the science you will see this. Your choice and I will respect it, I hope you will change your mind and see the benefits outweigh the risks as nothing is perfect, but it is your choice. Common sense is not so common sadly. The CDC/FDA is wanting masks and social distance till we get everyone vaccinated to help with slowing down the spread of a very dangerous and deadly virus. Spring break in Florida is showing just how crazy the lack of respect is causing. Wishing you all the best to be safe.

A thousand times this!. I'll add this as well. Even if the deniers were correct on the survival rate, they fail to see the larger math problem here. Even if it is only a 1% mortality rate, that is still 3.4 million in the U.S. (based off of the 340 million we have in this country alone), dead and given the contagious nature of COVID, that is where it would be eventually if we did absolutely nothing and 3.4 million, in this country, would be a bare minimum number if we were to subscribe to the herd immunity "theory" presented by those deniers last year.

A lot of the Covid deniers will point to the survival rate (while also pointing at the wrong number), but survival does not equal recovery. People survive cancer all the time, but they are often not able to do the things they once did. My old boss was a multi-time cancer survivor (it did get him eventually) but even when he was in remission he was relegated to a lifetime of medications that had side effects and he couldn’t take the stairs going up because he no longer had adrenal glands. So yeah, he survived cancer for a time, but he never recovered. The same is happening to people who get Covid.

The New York Post is a trash tabloid, but even then, the quotes are telling "half the nurses in the facility would not get the vaccine, citing political reasons." and "Survey respondents leaning against taking the vaccine said, among other reasons, that they were concerned how politics influenced the development of the vaccine". Also, that article is from December 30th, just a few weeks after the vaccine had been released. How about some up to date data, no? FALSE: The pandemic is not winding down. There are spikes again in a number of major cities including my own. ALSO FALSE - The administration has not changed testing procedures at the boarder. Anyone caught by CBP is held for 72 hours while they are tested. This is carry over policy from the previous administration. Biden Hasn't Reduced COVID-19 Testing at the Border - FactCheck.org - Lots of sources at the bottom too. But you're getting dangerously close to bumping into the No Politics rule. You've already used your final opportunity on that one. So move on from that point. ALSO FALSE - It is being well documented, however the full extent of the greater benefit is not yet fully known. ‘Natural Immunity’ From Covid Is Not Safer Than a Vaccine - The New York Times (nytimes.com) "Early evidence suggests that the Covid-19 vaccines may fall into this category. Volunteers who received the Moderna shot had more antibodies — one marker of immune response — in their blood than did people who had been sick with Covid-19." If you follow that link in the quote, it will take you to the NEJM where it will state in the report that people who had Covid-19 had 80% effectiveness while the vaccines have ~95% effectiveness. 80% < 95% Not my opinion... take it up with the New England Journal of Medicine, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and the 31 doctors that worked on the study. If you think you're more qualified to make an assessment than those doctors and organizations, please provide some credential so we know it's not just your opinion.

The reason they are still telling people to mask even if they’ve been vaccinated is that you can be an asymptomatic carrier. So even if your aren’t ill, you can carry the virus for a time and if you sneeze, say for seasonal allergies, you can spread the virus. That isn’t a reason to not get vaccinated. If the odds of winning a roll of the dice were 95% in a casino, I’ll take that bet every single time. Even if I hit the 5% and lose, I can roll again in 90 days. Risk assessment has been part of my job for over a decade and a half.

That is expected. The flu shot has a lower effectiveness than the Covid shot. None of the vaccines are expected to be 100%. However the vaccine is effective that even if you’re vaccinated and still get it you don’t end up in the hospital. so that is a major improvement over dying. That’s the point of the vaccine, to prevent mortality. That’s why getting the vaccine is important even with the variants.

Looks great, but at $110k plus it is another toy for the rich.

A good friend in Germany has an otherwise healthy 17 year old son who got it back in October and while he technically recovered, he has massive issues with his breathing and his energy levels, and that was just for starters. I would like to add that some famous folks got hit hard too. Maynard James Keenan (Tool lead singer) got COVID early last year and six months later, he was still not sure if he’d be able to sing live again because it wrecked his lungs. Just a few examples of the struggles folks are experiencing during these unprecedented times. COVID-19 has never been a “black and white” type of virus and the many problems I’ve read about after recovery on top of all the unnecessary deaths makes me take it very seriously and while I have a very strong immune system, others in my household do not so I bear their safety in mind whenever I head out to deal with the public. It’s just common sense to me.

There is no such thing as 'herd immunity'. While 'herd immunity' is related to the percentage of vaccinated people in a population, 'herd immunity' as proposed and explained and wished upon us during the Covid-19 pandemic was purely BS. As Drew puts it: The weak shall perish. (I think we as a species, have come a long way from our animal roots to be going back to the laws of the jungle and its 'only the strong shall survive' ) When a large percentage of a society is vaccinated, the spread of disease is limited and thus protects indirectly, the unimmunized people. The chain of infection is disrupted. But that does NOT mean that the disease is eliminated. No vaccines, and sometimes humans will NOT develop natural immunization and if the disease is deadly enough, it WILL wipe us all out of existence. No 'herd immunity' in that scenario as some politicians were clamoring on about, right? Plenty of diseases out there that fall into that category. Does Covid fall into that category? I dunno. I dont want to find out either, Even if 100% of the population is vaccinated, for 100 years continually, we humans sometimes STILL dont develop 100% immunity from certain diseases either from the vaccine OR naturally. Meaning, in some humans, vaccines do not work and meaning that some diseases just know our DNA biology and there is nothing to do about it. In some diseases, as you guys know, when there is a strong enough anti-vax movement, some diseases actually come back (stronger than ever) to haunt us. Ive read that there are some babies whose mother was vaccinated for Covid-19, and the baby had natural immunization from Covid-19. But Im not sure if all human babies develop natural immunization from Covid if mommy was vaccinated. Covid-19 is said to be with us forever now. Its going to be a part of our future dispelling the possibility of the scenario I described above where there HAS been some babies with natural immunity because of their mother's vaccination. Covid-19 is a bitch of a thing. As I understand it, its not about how weak you are or out of shape. Its how your own body, your OWN DNA make-up that decides your fate on how you will cope with it. There has been healthy 20 year old athletes (male AND female) that have fallen really sick from it and there has been deaths too. Just as there has been asymptomatic 80 year olds. Covid-19 patients all have different symptoms. A wide range of symptoms. Covid-19 patients also have a wide range of body organs failing. Not all have their lungs being attacked. Some have had kidney failure only. Liver failure only. Some have had neurological failure. Some were all of the above. Some were a mixture of. Whatever your personal decisions are....just stay safe please!

My Most Favorite Mid 80's GM Car, 1986 Monte Carlo SS Aero-coupe This is a pretty hot car too! Sweet Camaro SS Love me some GTO baby! Lovely Green Camaro Is it me or does Florida have allot of nice Muscle Cars? Coronet 440 anyone?

Had some ham, biscuits and gravy, and Cadbury eggs...

Will be interesting to see how it compares to the Rivian.

My wife is a healthcare worker and she and a LOT of other doctors and health workers I know are not in a huge rush to get mRNA based vaccine. The vaccine absolutely works for now but NOONE yet knows LONG TERM implications of the mRNA based vaccines. That is the reason FDA gave TEMPORARY Emergency approval. They don't have full approval of the FDA because it is simply not yet fully tested. Personally, I probably will be eligible soon for the vaccine and I plan to get it simply because I want to start traveling and not worrying that I will get sick badly. But if I have a chance I will get J&J vaccine, not Pfizer or Moderna.

And the case of the Uglies rolls on with EVs. Why does every EV have to be so god damn ugly!?! I like the numbers from the power train, but the car could be powered by the risen Jesus pedaling hard and I still wouldn’t drive that thing. So far, the only EVs I think look decent are the Audi, Porsche, and Volvo/Polestar. The Rivians look great. The BMW, MB, Hummer, and Bolt all look ugly or dorky. The Teslas and Jaguar are meh. If the Cadillacs stay close to concept they should look pretty good, but Cadillac has a habit or producing gorgeous concepts and then dumbing them down a lot for production.

I have friends in Boulder Colorado who got it very early in the pandemic, just before things started getting locked down. They were sick for a month and pulled through, however a year later they still have after effects. This is a very healthy couple who would get out and exercise regularly and go hiking in the mountains. These days they get winded climbing up the one flight of stairs to their apartment. As far as I know they haven’t had any chest X-rays, but there’s plenty of evidence that they’ve suffered long term/permanent lung damage. They’re the same age as me.

Wild that it's not fenced at all.

Without vaccines, “herd immunity” is just another way of saying “the weak shall perish”. These vaccines have been in development for over a decade and that’s the only reason they were done so quickly. They were trying to develop a vaccine for common cold viruses and the work they did for that translated directly into a Covid-19 vaccine. I would expect CDC guidance to change as the situation changes and new things are learned, that’s just common sense. My whole pod is vaccinated now, so we’re able to gather as a family for the first time since last year for Easter. So far, the vaccine is proving to be effective against severe illness when someone is infected with the variants. I expect all of those who get vaccinated will need boosters at some point. I get my flu vaccine every year, I’ll get the Covid one as often as needed.

I had an internal struggle regarding the price argument. Yes, an ICE version of the SAME model that also has an EV version, will be CONSIDERABLY LESS. No buts, ifs or ands. But we CONTINUE to bang that drum all across the EV board. And its kinda false. We seem to always make this argument and to justify our point we will take a LESSER ICE vehicle and compare it DIRECTLY to a more advanced EV model... Example from last week: We took a 26 000 dollar base Escape and compared it to a 50 000 dollar Mach E. Wrong in 2 ways: 1. base model family CUV 2. FAMILY CUV We then proceeded to compare the Mach E to its other brother. The Escape's bigger brother. The Edge. While the Edge is closer in spirit to the Mach E, THIS is where my internal struggle begins. While in those two scenarios, the Mach E and EVs in general, seem to lose the value argument on fuel savings and we equate that being more expensive than their ICE counterparts. BUT... after reading and listening to many other opinions on how ICE vehicles average transaction prices are going up and up and up...I started looking at another angle that EVERYBODY seems to miss. More or less on the Mach E rather than another EV. I done a quick research and found that a BMW X4 is actually about the same price as a Mach E... The exterior and interior dimensions are 99.9% identical. https://www.cars.com/research/compare/?acodes=USD10FOS392B0,USD10BMS261A0 In this case of a Mach E and a BMW X4, I wanna know why are we tooting that EVs are inherently pricier? Both are lifestyle, sporty coupey CUVs trying to sell to the same lifestyle, sporty coupey CUV buyer which is a more affluent buyer. And BOTH the Bimmer and the Ford are marketing to. The Escape is just a pedestrian, family haulin', CUV for the Average Joe. Doesnt seem logical to me to try and tell me EVs are pricier than when we do comparisons like that. When you look at the EV that is the Mach E and we compare it to a VERY comparable and SIMILAR ICE CUV in EVERY way INCLUDING to what market niche they BOTH belong to...then in THIS case I'll have to argue that: NO! EVs are not NECESSARILY more pricier than their ICE counterparts. At least in THIS case, they are actually the SAME price. I see progress to which EVs are starting to get price parity as their ICE counterparts ESPECIALLY when ICE average transaction prices are going higher. And when we choose to say that EVs are just 2% of the market place, its NOT the EVs that are making the average transaction price go up. Its ICE vehicles themselves. I dont want to confuse the situation and you folk will think that Im saying that EVs have price parity...Ive said in the beginning of this thought that turned into a long post that they do not. Its just that in the coming year or two, when many EV models will be available to the US consumer from GM, VW and others, many scenarios like this one will be replicated. And eventually, cheaper MSRP EV models will be introduced. When will that be? I do not know. But in the 40 000-60 000 dollar range, EVs will CERTAINLY be on par with their ICE counterparts offering same interior and exterior dimensions, luxury and options and even LONGER drive ranges than fuel tanks...