Post Vaccination Behavior

[Ronstar]

I went for a haircut a few days ago. Nobody in the place had a mask on except for myself and the lady cutting my hair. I asked what the deal was because they used to have a mask mandate. She said the workers do whatever their customers do. She’s vaccinated, and I am also, so we took off our masks.

Podiatrist appt yesterday was the same routine since last year. Call from parking lot to be let in. Temp check on arrival. Mask on the whole time in the building. ( I even had my mask on during surgery with oxygen tubes in my nostrils last November)

I suspect that many doctors offices will keep mask mandates and other safety measures for quite some time.

 

[jim584672]

I'm glad the CDC did this. The holdouts will have to worry, maybe they will have a change of mind now.

 

[audreyh1]

I'm glad the CDC did this. The holdouts will have to worry, maybe they will have a change of mind now.

Was thinking about the otherwise qualified holdouts too. “Oh no! What if I’m exposed to an infected person not wearing a mask! I better get my vaccination ASAP!”

 

[USGrant1962]

Correct. And if you choose not to, take your business to a competing establishment that doesn't require it.
We have one grocery chain in town that still requires them, but about 5 that don't. Those more comfortable being masked will shop at the one, and I will shop at the others. That's the beauty of capitalism in a free country.

I do foresee new signs outside some businesses:

No Shoes
No Shirt
No Mask
No Service!

Well, so far today Walmart, Trader Joe's, Costco, and Publix have announced that they won't require masks for vaccinated customers*. I guess they believe the vaccines work.

In the end, I'm not convinced there will be a measurable cohort of private businesses that continue to require masks for vaccinated customers. IMO, a business' obligation is to protect its employees by ensuring they are vaccinated or they wear masks. In our over-lawyered society, I'm sure many will post signs saying masks required for non-vaccinated, but I don't foresee private enforcement on patrons.

*In all cases, where local/state mandates allow based on local conditions.

 

[Ready]

Telling unvaccinated people to wear masks is just CYA for the CDC. If by this point you have elected not to get the vaccine, how likely are you to voluntarily wear a mask? I’d be willing to bet there is a high correlation between anti-vaxers and anti-maskers. Nobody is going to ask you if you’ve been vaccinated before entering a store. I don’t think it really matters to people who have been vaccinated. But there is still the under age 12 group that has some risk. I think the CDC rushed this one through before it was time.

 

[RobbieB]

You have to check to see if they're open for sit in before you go. I didn't one time and drove for nothing.

 

[RAE]

But the CDC has no way to estimate now many of those 114M have also been vaccinated. There is an obvious overlap, but how big no one can know (more or less than the general population? Anything is a guess, not an estimate, as there's been no tracking on that).

If you assume there's as much as a 75% overlap, then it's not anything like another 1/3. If there's a 50% uptake, then ok 1/6. But we'd all be just guessing and cannot state any number as a fact.

Estimates I've seen on this are usually around 50% or so - that is, perhaps 50% of the people who had COVID still got the vaccine. It may be more or less than that, but the point is that, in any case there are a lot of people out there who have COVID-induced immunity, even if they chose to not get the vaccine. That has to be a big help in reaching the "tipping point" we seem to be reaching now, where cases continue to drop across much of the country.

 

[audreyh1]

Telling unvaccinated people to wear masks is just CYA for the CDC. If by this point you have elected not to get the vaccine, how likely are you to voluntarily wear a mask? I’d be willing to bet there is a high correlation between anti-vaxers and anti-maskers. Nobody is going to ask you if you’ve been vaccinated before entering a store. I don’t think it really matters to people who have been vaccinated. But there is still the under age 12 group that has some risk. I think the CDC rushed this one through before it was time.

Also the 12-15 group just got approval, so even if they rush out to get vaccinated today, they are still 5-6 weeks away from fully vaccinated, even though they will start to get some strong protection after 2 weeks from first dose. The protection from the variants of concern is not as strong until after the second dose.

It takes a while.

Yes, I expect many unvaccinated to forgo masks and we’ll see how this plays out.

We may “be approaching a tipping point” but we can’t know that, and won’t know that until after the fact.

 

[sengsational]

Also immunity from prior infections is not as strong as immunity from vaccines.

That’s right. I’ve heard several virologist’s say that the immunity conferred from the vaccine is much higher quality. Which is why they encourage people who know they had Covid-19 to still get vaccinated.

This may have been the simplified message intended, but unjustified based on how immunity works and based on data collected so far. When the authorities dumb-down the message, society looses, as we've seen throughout the pandemic.

Just because some virologists think it's so, does carry weight, but I suggest some virologists think that having immunity only to the spike is less effective than having a more broad immunity (to other parts of the virus). Time will tell, but by then, most everyone will have moved-on, and will never learn how it panned-out.

Telling unvaccinated people to wear masks is just CYA for the CDC. If by this point you have elected not to get the vaccine, how likely are you to voluntarily wear a mask?.

I'm glad the CDC did this. The holdouts will have to worry, maybe they will have a change of mind now.

I believe that one should be careful when characterizing those yet to be vaccinated. Most of us here have time to decide where to go, time to get the vaccination (time off work), transportation to get there, time to recover, if needed. And that, weighed against a somewhat probable severe case. Now someone who has zero time, a jerk for a boss, job loss means severe financial consequences, and young, so less perceived risk (although substantial). In short, if there were a magic wand, they'd say "yes".

 

[MarieIG]

Well, at my office, certain fully vaccinated persons, have been surreptitiously meeting with other fully vaccinated persons and indulging in maskless conversations.

 

[audreyh1]

Well, at my office, certain fully vaccinated persons, have been surreptitiously meeting with other fully vaccinated persons and indulging in maskless conversations.

OMG!

 

[Ready]

I believe that one should be careful when characterizing those yet to be vaccinated. Most of us here have time to decide where to go, time to get the vaccination (time off work), transportation to get there, time to recover, if needed. And that, weighed against a somewhat probable severe case. Now someone who has zero time, a jerk for a boss, job loss means severe financial consequences, and young, so less perceived risk (although substantial). In short, if there were a magic wand, they'd say "yes".

I will only comment on the current environment in my own community in Southern California. We have more supply than demand. No appointments are required and you can walk in to any CVS or Walgreens now and ask for a shot. These places are open 7 days a week, and some pharmacies are even open 24 hours a day. There is no cost to getting a shot. So if getting vaccinated is important to you, you will have found a way to do so by now.

 

[truenorth418]

I will only comment on the current environment in my own community in Southern California. We have more supply than demand. No appointments are required and you can walk in to any CVS or Walgreens now and ask for a shot. These places are open 7 days a week, and some pharmacies are even open 24 hours a day. There is no cost to getting a shot. So if getting vaccinated is important to you, you will have found a way to do so by now.

Well said.

 

[MarieIG]

+1

This may have been the simplified message intended, but unjustified based on how immunity works and based on data collected so far. When the authorities dumb-down the message, society looses, as we've seen throughout the pandemic.

- Yes, some of the circulating information has been dumbed-down and at times, inaccurate.


Just because some virologists think it's so, does carry weight, but I suggest some virologists think that having immunity only to the spike is less effective than having a more broad immunity (to other parts of the virus). Time will tell, but by then, most everyone will have moved-on, and will never learn how it panned-out.

- I had wondered about that, and subsequently heard this addressed by Dr. Mobeen Syed.


I believe that one should be careful when characterizing those yet to be vaccinated. Most of us here have time to decide where to go, time to get the vaccination (time off work), transportation to get there, time to recover, if needed. And that, weighed against a somewhat probable severe case. Now someone who has zero time, a jerk for a boss, job loss means severe financial consequences, and young, so less perceived risk (although substantial). In short, if there were a magic wand, they'd say "yes".

 

[RAE]

This may have been the simplified message intended, but unjustified based on how immunity works and based on data collected so far. When the authorities dumb-down the message, society loses, as we've seen throughout the pandemic.

Just because some virologists think it's so, does carry weight, but I suggest some virologists think that having immunity only to the spike is less effective than having a more broad immunity (to other parts of the virus). Time will tell, but by then, most everyone will have moved-on, and will never learn how it panned-out.

+1, I agree. The dumbed-down message so far is that "we have no idea how long virus-induced immunity will last, but just in case it does not last too long, everyone should get the vaccine, even those who have had COVID". I understand that, from a public health standpoint, it's desirable to have as many people vaccinated as possible. But that doesn't mean that those who have already had COVID are not already fully protected. When the SARS outbreak occurred back in 2002-04, work on a vaccine was started, but then never finished, as the outbreak faded pretty quickly. Recent studies looking at those who contracted the SARS virus back then shows almost all of them still have very strong, durable immunity to the virus, some 17-19 years later. The SARS virus is a coronavirus, similar in many ways to the current COV-SARS-2 virus. That is one reason why many virologists expect that those who have had COVID and recovered are very likely to have similar durable immunity to being infected again. And the recent studies I posted earlier do indicate that most of those who have had COVID have strong immunity 8 months after they had symptoms, which is about as far out as it can be studied at this point.



Personally, I prefer to learn about the science behind things like this, so that I can make my own informed decision. YMMV.

 

[Chuckanut]

I believe that one should be careful when characterizing those yet to be vaccinated. Most of us here have time to decide where to go, time to get the vaccination (time off work), transportation to get there, time to recover, if needed. And that, weighed against a somewhat probable severe case. Now someone who has zero time, a jerk for a boss, job loss means severe financial consequences, and young, so less perceived risk (although substantial). In short, if there were a magic wand, they'd say "yes".

+1

I have several friends who are now planning to get the Shingrex vaccine after spending a few years thinking they would never need it. Mostly, it seems that friends who have had shingles finally managed to put the fear of god into them.

OTOH, I know a nurse who refuses to get any Covid vaccine. Her source for her information on the vaccines is an MD who writes various diet and health books. He has one or two [-]performances[/-] lectures you can see on your local PBS station several times a year when they have a fund raiser week. Personally, I would not include him in my sources of reliable information. But, to each his/her own.

 

[Lienlord]

Somewhat related to this...I had chickenpox before there was a vaccine. I had shingles before there was a vaccine. I also had a pretty strong case of Covid (at the beginning of the outbreak) before there was a vaccine. Because of my existing immunity, I never later got the chickenpox or shingles vaccines.
For that reason, at this point, I’m inclined to view the Covid vaccine as equally unnecessary and even (potentially) harmful to someone with existing antibodies in their system.
I don’t feel my concern is reckless or ignorant, and consider myself someone who is very well informed after researching many credible sources.
I would never judge anyone in a similar situation for making a different decision, and would hope to receive the same measure of grace. Just wanted to share my perspective in a transparent way.

 

[explanade]

Why do you think vaccine could be potentially harmful to those who may have had covid already?

What info are you basing this notion on?

 

[Lienlord]

Why do you think vaccine could be potentially harmful to those who may have had covid already?

What info are you basing this notion on?

As mentioned in previous posts, the antibodies built up around the spike proteins are potentially not as broad immunization against variants that naturally occurring antibodies could be. Also, in the (justified) rush to get a vaccine out to as many uninfected people as possible, no extensive study has been done to not only demonstrate superior efficacy to naturally induced antibodies, but also what potential negative impacts the introduction of a competing antigen could have on an already immune system. Some of these answers may not be found for many months/years as the longer term impacts can be studied. So at this point I don’t want to be in that control group! LOL!
Thanks for asking and letting me answer as best I can!

 

[Aerides]

I will only comment on the current environment in my own community in Southern California. We have more supply than demand. No appointments are required and you can walk in to any CVS or Walgreens now and ask for a shot. These places are open 7 days a week, and some pharmacies are even open 24 hours a day. There is no cost to getting a shot. So if getting vaccinated is important to you, you will have found a way to do so by now.

While that's all true, it's really only been that way country-wide for the past 2-3 weeks. So someone young who hasn't been paying attention, who was previously told to expect "late summer" might not be terribly aware.

This week, NYC started no-appointment vaccine pop ups in several larger subways, and are doing hundreds per day at each site. So, there are a lot of people, mostly younger workers, out there who will get vaccinated when it's made into a near-zero-effort situation. I imagine there are millions like that, busy younger people who aren't gonna spend days scouring vaccine finders like we all did, but will take it when they can just stop for a few extra minutes on their way to work some morning.

 

[timo2]

Some (like Gottlieb) seem to be consistently on the mark. Others (names withheld) predicted tragedies such as a USA Covid hurricane in April. It's their shtick. And their shtick doesn't seem to allow for any joy in the populace.

Back to Post-Vaccination behavior, Dr. Gottlieb made a prediction style statement the other day that makes me want to include it in my post-vaccination trip planning. If I'm driving somewhere, I might want to avoid COVID hot spots, if possible. I jokingly thought google maps needs a check box, similar to the 'avoid toll roads', but 'avoid COVID hot spots. But there is enough data out there to calculate that myself.

Here is what was said on May 9, 2021 Face the Nation:
"JOHN DICKERSON: When you look at the map of places that have not had a lot of people getting vaccinated, do you expect that those will be, in the future, the places where we might see some occasional flare ups between now and- and the next big stage of this?

DR. GOTTLIEB: I think that's probably right. And as vaccine effectiveness perhaps declines as we head into the fall and the winter for people who were vaccinated a full year ago, I think we're going to have to look at the data closely on that, how much of a decline you get in protection. But that's a long ways off. We'll worry about that in the fall and the winter. I do think we're going to have to contend with COVID again this winter. And we may have to reimplement mask ordinances in certain settings where we have outbreaks or even close schools in certain settings. But I think it's going to be much more reactive. We're going to be reacting and putting public health measures in place based on measures of spread and not these sort of widespread ordinances that we have right now. I think we need to start lifting these things as the situation improves, also to demonstrate that we can do that and that we maintain our integrity and our ability to reimplement these things when we have to. The public has to trust that public health officials are going to lift these restrictions as quickly as they put them in place as the conditions improve. And that's probably partly what's holding back the economy right now. People are not going back to work, not just because of these benefits. I know there's been a lot of talk about that, but also because they're being told they have to wear masks and still have to exercise cautions that probably in many parts of this country you don't have to do. You look at San Francisco, 20 cases a day, more than 70% of the population vaccinated. Very good testing in place. They don't need mask ordinances indoors anymore and certainly not outside.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/transc...es-coronavirus-on-face-the-nation-may-9-2021/

 

[timo2]

Just to point out typos those comments were on May 9 2021, not 2020.

Thanks, I fixed it. It was just this month!

 

[Alan]

On Monday morning we will be at a hospital in Newcastle to give a blood sample as part of the mixed vaccine trial we are in. We planned to visit the ancient town of Tynemouth on the way back but there has just been an outbreak of the Covid variant B.1.617 that has hit the town. B.1.617 was first discovered in India, and since this a “variant of concern” and mass testing is underway in several parts of the country because of other B.1.617 outbreaks we have decided to go elsewhere on our way home.

Even though it has been 4 weeks since our 2nd vaccine we still don’t feel like knowingly traveling into Covid hotspots.

 

[audreyh1]

On Monday morning we will be at a hospital in Newcastle to give a blood sample as part of the mixed vaccine trial we are in. We planned to visit the ancient town of Tynemouth on the way back but there has just been an outbreak of the Covid variant B.1.617 that has hit the town. B.1.617 was first discovered in India, and since this a “variant of concern” and mass testing is underway in several parts of the country because of other B.1.617 outbreaks we have decided to go elsewhere on our way home.

Even though it has been 4 weeks since our 2nd vaccine we still don’t feel like knowingly traveling into Covid hotspots.

Don’t blame you.

I wish our county cases were lower. We’re at an average of 13 new cases per 100,000 over two weeks, while Harris County (Houston) is considerably lower at 5. There are some “hotspot” counties considerably higher.

 

[Retch The Grate]

Are your concerns due to lack of confidence in the vaccine? From all accounts it's very reliable.

I've got zero interest in being in unmasked in close quarters with unmasked people that I don't know have been vaccinated. Has nothing to do with the relative efficacy of the J&J vaccine that I got and everything to do with the risk profile of unvaccinated people. The vaccines are not 100% effective in preventing infection and we don't have data on what long term symptoms a non-hospitalization requiring infection of Covid may be. J&J is extremely effective against death and acute hospitalization from Covid, but right now there are a lot of questions around what leads to long haul Covid, how much damage there is, etc. I'd like to enjoy my life and my activities AND avoid having personal experience with the latter.