1. https://www.acsh.org/news/2021/09/07/covid-19-vaccines-preve...
https://ourworldindata.org/covid-cases
And testing rates are probably even lower now that many people have been vaccinated.
This argument is not going to convince the unvaccinated, who are tired of incoherent "scientific" information that changes every month. The field of virology is apparently in its infancy.
but much lower hospitalisation rates [0]. Which is the key point of "flattening the curve" if you remember. We're not going to get out of lockdown measures until the hospitals can cope with the load, and the vaccinations are reducing the load on hospitals. Get vaccinated now.
There were no accurate spread models in 2020, no studies how masks would affect the spread of the common cold.
There was ridiculous advice that the famous droplets would sink to the ground before covering a distance > 1.5 meters, that masks would not help at all and much more.
Now they admit that the virus is airborne!
Sorry, #FollowTheScience slogans and calling others fools does not help.
>the more my arm is twisted, the more I will resist
I don't know where you get your information but I saw absolutely zero change in the info on any of the major vaccines since the very same day they've been announced. From day 1 the message was always that these vaccines trained the immune system to lower the severity of Covid symptoms, but otherwise we could still catch it and spread it.
Then only significant change that popped up since last year was due to the inception of the so called Delta variant, which is an entirely new development and had just enough mutations to lower vaccine effectiveness. However, the mRNA vaccines were, from the very start, described as custom tailored to the existing variants, and we're expected to show a drop in effectiveness if the wrong kind of variant occurred.
Personally, when I received my jabs, in both occasions I received a small flier making it quite clear that the current Covid vaccines only trained the immune system to have a fighting chance against Covid, but we were still vulnerable to catch and spread Covid and thus we should continue to practice basic health and safety precautions.
So I really wonder where you got your info, because none of what you said correlates with reality.
The actual study the article claims the summarize:
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laninf/article/PIIS1473-3...
Find the word 'delta' in the text of the actual study. It ain't there. And look at the dates of the study. Most of the data is pre-delta.
Your linked ACSH article simply fabricates a conclusion based on no evidence.
The scientific establishment sickens me here. The goal is to get people to vaccinate, which is reasonable enough. The outcome is the opposite, though. The lies are common enough and transparent enough that the whole establishment loses credibility, and a huge swath of the world doesn't believe it about vaccines, climate change, and a slew of other issues.
And unfortunately right now science is playing catch-up.
There simply isn't any evidence on breakthrough transmission with delta testing humans yet because it is recent. The headlines and public health messages are assuming worst case in order to scare vaccinated people into masking up again, while there's actually indications that vaccinated breakthrough infections almost certainly transmit less.
What we know is that while early in the infection viral loads in delta are much higher, but Alpha, delta, and non-VOI/VOC infections feature similar viral trajectories[1], in vaccinated breakthrough infections RNA load declines faster[2] and the ability to culture virus in breakthrough infections is lower[3], we know that vaccines reduced transmission with alpha[4] and apart from scary headlines we still expect that vaccines reduce transmission with delta. While there's documented cases of delta breakthrough infections transmitting to one or two other people, there's not been any studies of how common that is, or how common it is for breakthrough infections to become superspreaders to >10 people, or if that is even possible. Since viral loads are correlated with transmissibility and symptomology/virulence the very high protection against severe disease with vaccination may also protect against severe transmission.
[1] https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.02.16.21251535v...
[2] https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.28.21261295v...
[3] https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.08.20.21262158v...
[4] https://www.timesofisrael.com/80-of-vaccinated-covid-carrier...
That is not the case.
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02187-1
"“The bottom line is, this can happen — it can be true that vaccinated people can spread the virus. But we do not yet know what their relative role in overall community spread is,” says co-author Thomas Friedrich, a virologist at the University of Wisconsin–Madison."
Vaccinations may (or may not) reduce the propensity of vaccinated people to spread Delta but it's very clear at this point vaccinated people can spread Delta to some degree.
As a footnote, we do have data. My best estimate was that the vaccine reduced the transmission of delta by about 50%. That's based on data in the community I live (and this is context-dependent -- for example, vaccines do a lot more for casual interactions than for close/long ones).
I saw that same estimate replicated by two data scientists I trust, using different data from different places, and different methodologies, so it's somewhat robust. On the other hand, all three were susceptible to Simpson's Paradox and demographic bias, so there is one possible source of correlated error (specifically, more at-risk populations have higher vaccination rates). However, even if we assume a best-case there, though, transmission is reduced by <90%.
Fortunately, the CDC's Sept. 2021 updated definition makes it clear that non-sterilizing Covid vaccines should not be conflated with the transmission-stopping track record of sterilizing vaccines (e.g. MMR) mandated for school & travel.
There are intranasal (e.g. inhaler) vaccines under development, which may provide nasal/mucosal antibodies. Until those are available, recovery from natural infection will provide both nasal/mucosal and blood/serum antibodies. This path is available to both the vaccinated and unvaccinated.
https://www.businessinsider.com/delta-variant-made-herd-immu...