To not understand the vaccine drama

[Lei8133]

I am so confused by all this anti-vaxxer hate and mandating the COVID vaccine for certain professions extra. IMO if you have had the vaccine (which I have, well I’m awaiting my 2nd dose) surely people who haven’t had the jab pose no increased threat to us. The only people they cause harm to are fellow anti-vaxxers and other unvaccinated people for whom the risk is always present.

Surely whether we like it or not it is a personal choice whether you receive the vaccine or not and the freedom of choice is something we should all advocate for whether we agree with the decision or not surely?!? I just don’t get it and the divide it is causes amongst friends, family and the greater society is saddening. AIBU?!?! If so can someone explain to me how unvaccinated relatives and friends are potentially harmful to me despite having received the jab?

And as for wendy woofer you have no idea what you're talking about but I imagine.it makes you feel better.to label people as.anti vax and slag them off

So are you saying people who choose not to take the vaccine are at no more risk of getting serious CV symptoms which need hospital treatment, and possible ventilation, than those who have had both vaccines??

No, I'm saying stop calling us all anti vaxxers and selfish. You have no idea why I'm not having it and I'm not obliged to discuss my reasons with you

No, I'm saying stop calling us all anti vaxxers and selfish. You have no idea why I'm not having it and I'm not obliged to discuss my reasons with you

I agreed with a poster who mentioned anti vaxxers. I didn’t call you an anti vaxxer. I couldn’t care less why you are not having the vaccine. I couldn’t care less if you contract covid. All I care about is people who choose not to have the vaccine are the ones who will need hospital treatment if they contract covid and closing the wards to everyone else.

You don’t think it’s fair to take away people’s freedom of choice. I don’t think it’s fair for people to not have access to much needed (lifesaving) hospital treatment because of other peoples selfish choices.

Everyone that can have the vaccine needs to have the vaccine.

And I don't think it's fair to bully people who have decided not to have a particular medical procedure

And I don't think it's fair to bully people who have decided not to have a particular medical procedure

Nobody is bullying you. You started accusing me of all sorts that I didn’t say. I defended myself. End of.

The UK is the one of the most vaccine enthusiastic countries in the world, if not the most. It’s why we’ve only just been able to offer jabs to all over 18s - takeup has been exceptionally high.

So as much as some people grumble about being labelled and criticised for not taking the vaccine, they should really be appreciative of the widespread social acceptance of covid vaccines in this country. It’s this attitude that will shortly get us out of this whole mess. It’s also our high adult vaccination rates that will mean we don’t need to push to vaccinate children, unlike countries like the US, which are now relying on vaccinate children to attain herd immunity.

But this idea that you live in the least vaccine hesitant country there is, that you will be soon reaping the rewards of that without yourself being vaccinated, and you then moan about it? Ridiculous.

Just do it! It makes you safer, and it makes the rest of us safer.

@WendyWoofer

No, I'm saying stop calling us all anti vaxxers and selfish. You have no idea why I'm not having it and I'm not obliged to discuss my reasons with you

I agreed with a poster who mentioned anti vaxxers. I didn’t call you an anti vaxxer. I couldn’t care less why you are not having the vaccine. I couldn’t care less if you contract covid. All I care about is people who choose not to have the vaccine are the ones who will need hospital treatment if they contract covid and closing the wards to everyone else.

You don’t think it’s fair to take away people’s freedom of choice. I don’t think it’s fair for people to not have access to much needed (lifesaving) hospital treatment because of other peoples selfish choices.

People are missing out on much needed (lifesaving) hospital treatment because the government and PHE have turned the NHS into the National Covid Service not because Jenny at number 10 has declined the vaccine

Plus if they contract Covid they are the ones most likely to need hospital treatment
I don't know why this is always said, and with such aplomb. You don't know that.

What bothers me about anti-vaxxers - along with the great points already made - is that a lot of people are taking the word of other anti-vaxxers rather than doing their own research. Influencers on social media are hugely irresponsible for spouting their own beliefs and their jobs are as they state, they influence people. Young people are believing the misinformation they give and try to pass this off as reasons why not to have it. So many people who I thought were intelligent are quite clearly idiots. Saddening that people think it is ok to encourage people to not have it rather than encouraging them to look at the research and statistics from reputable sources and making their own minds up. I don’t see half as many people encouraging people to have the vaccine as passionately as those against the vaccine.

Currently, with hospital admissions, its people who haven't been vaccinated who make up a larger percentage than those who have.

If vaccinations are the way forward, why are we still living with restrictions after nearly 80% of the British public have been vaccinated?

Because 80% of the public haven’t been vaccinated. 81% of adults have had a first dose. Which even with the alpha strain would have been enough.

Our catastrophically, criminally stupid excuse for a government decided to prioritise Modi’s ego over keeping delta out of this country, even though there was already mounting concern about what was happening in India, and Pakistan and Bangladesh were added to the red list. In the three weeks they delayed adding India, delta was strongly seeded in the UK.

Two problems: delta is much more transmissible (meaning more people need to be vaccinated to contain it) and a single dose of vaccine is less effective against delta (thankfully two doses still looks good). 59% of adults have had two doses.

So here we are. With alpha dominant, we should have been pretty much done and dusted by now.

With delta, you are probably going to need nearly all adults to have immunity of one kind or another to achieve the same result. And so we wait, because our government prioritised a face-saving Brexit photo op over all of our lives and livelihoods.

@WendyWoofer

No, I'm saying stop calling us all anti vaxxers and selfish. You have no idea why I'm not having it and I'm not obliged to discuss my reasons with you

I agreed with a poster who mentioned anti vaxxers. I didn’t call you an anti vaxxer. I couldn’t care less why you are not having the vaccine. I couldn’t care less if you contract covid. All I care about is people who choose not to have the vaccine are the ones who will need hospital treatment if they contract covid and closing the wards to everyone else.

You don’t think it’s fair to take away people’s freedom of choice. I don’t think it’s fair for people to not have access to much needed (lifesaving) hospital treatment because of other peoples selfish choices.

🙌🙌🙌 Yes yes yes Why should my tax money pay for that CF selfish behaviour, set this country back, keep us in lockdown and affect NHS resources that should go towards the vulnerable and sick when we need it. Oh but yes, when you get really ill you'll be relying on doctors opinions and scientific expertise. Yeesh.

Our catastrophically, criminally stupid excuse for a government decided to prioritise Modi’s ego over keeping delta out of this country, even though there was already mounting concern about what was happening in India, and Pakistan and Bangladesh were added to the red list. In the three weeks they delayed adding India, delta was strongly seeded in the UK

Totally agree. Our government has been appalling through the Covid crisis.

@User179335678 there is a whole advertising campaign advocating the jab...

@MyrrAgain - When did taxes come onto this?!? That statement implies that people who don’t want the jab don’t pay taxes?!?!

Apologies for using the term anti-vaxxers - I only use it to coney a sentiment regarding the covid vaccine in particular and not a general attitude to vaccination. @BonnieDundee

@Whyevencare I agree, they are also the ones to blame for job losses and loss of revenue etc,

Please someone reply to my last post!!! I’m begging!! Lol

Please someone reply to my last post!!! I’m begging!! Lol

You can’t close or delete a thread without excellent reason and you need to ask MNHQ directly. I can’t see here any of the reasons they’d delete a thread so I’d be surprised (and disappointed) if they did.

Stifling debate isn’t an excellent look.

@Lei8133 I don't think you can close a thread, mn has to delete it.

@JassyRadlett hahaha, dang!

I’m not trying to stifle debate- I didn’t actually ask for a debate about vaccines. I asked for others opinions on whether I was wrong/misguided for not being offended by non-covid vaccinators and if so for examples of threat posed to me as an individual by those around me who were not vaccinated. Lol.

Well if Covid vaccine be the good of love, play on!

It's pretty simple really. Ask yourself what would have happened if people had refused the smallpox vaccine. The answer is that we'd still have smallpox and people would die a horrible death, or survive with disfigurement.

But people had (and welcomed) the vaccine and now it's eradicated from the planet. Millions of lives saved.

That's why we have vaccines, and why people should have them (medical exemptions excluded).

*food

@neron & @JassyRadlett thanks for letting me know

You are far far far more likely to get very sick from catching Covid than from being vaccinated.

^This. And it isn't just the risk of death or even hospitalisation. Long Covid is a risk to young and healthy people. (I'm a sufferer of this myself.) The majority won't catch it, obviously, but it's certainly more of a risk than the side effects of the vaccines.

@BonnieDundee unless there is a valid medical reason for you not to take it you are being selfish and self interested.

With regard to younger people, it's a more difficult story regarding how sick they may or may not get. There is certainly an argument that blood clotting risk starts to outweigh Covid risk with certain vaccines.

However, we need the young to vaccinate in order to reduce the risk of a particularly virulent strain, and to reduce the spread.

Sadly, this is a global issue, and keeping the UK in good shape is ultimately 'p....ing in the wind' if the entire world can't get on top of things.

I can see how particularly wary people are unsure about vaccines, and with the blood clotting issue, that only serves to heighten their fears, however improbable (statistically) it may be.

Ultimately, as a population, the more people get vaccinated, the less deaths, and conversely, the less people get vaccinated, the more deaths.

To say 'My choice not to get vaccinated, doesn't affect anybody else' is ultimately not true. Yes, it's a personal choice. Yes, nobody should be forced. We all make choices in life that affect others, sometimes disastrously, but at least acknowledge the choice being made, rather than claim it has zero bearing.

I don't think people should be castigated for making such a choice though. After all, we were all happy to get the vaccine ahead of others in the world when arguably others needed it more than us. That cost lives too.

People need to stop parroting the trope that if you don't have the vaccine you'll end up using hospital resources.

I've had Covid. I didn't need hospital or even a GP. I've not seen any evidence that says having had it once and suffered no more than mild flu like symptoms I'm bound to be hospitalised next time.

Of all the many people I know who have had Covid, only 2 of them needed medical treatment (and only one of them was admitted to hospital).

Conversely, I know 3 people who have been hospitalised following the vaccine, and one who died.