i
This is already a big difference
There's a big difference between what is known as a
relative difference and an
absolute difference.
For example, suppose we both participate in the lottery and I say to you that I actually have 100% more chance of winning than you do. 100% !
I mean that's like a massive advantage isn't it?
But the reality is simply this.
You bought 1 lottery ticket. I bought 2 lottery tickets.
Neither of us are going to win the lottery as the reality, the numbers that actually count, tell us that our chances are utterly miniscule and thus my additional 100% chance of winning, my having twice the chance of winning that you do, is actually pretty worthless.
So yes, the difference between the 185 cases of Covid in the placebo group and the 11 in the vaccine group looks significant if you ignore the big picture. That's why Pfizer say it's 94% effective. But when you properly expose those numbers in the context of the trial then you realise that there were only 185 cases of Covid amongst 15,000 participants in the placebo group and so their chances of getting Covid from the "get go" were utterly tiny.
98.8% of the people in that group didn't get Covid despite not being vaccinated. As stated earlier, those are fantastic odds. I'll take them every day of the week and twice on Sundays. That the vaccines could increase those already fantastic chances to 99.9% really doesn't interest me one iota. No more than buying 2 lottery tickets makes me think I am really that much more likely to win.
But of course each to their own. If people want to risk the side effects associated with vaccines for that kind of increase in chances then by all means go and get the shots. Everyone is different, we're all at differing levels of risk.
Josho said:
The risk of getting covid grows though, as more and more people get covid.
Ok but getting Covid is not really the issue. How Covid affects you is the issue. I have no doubt that my body is subjected daily to a wide range of pathogens, viruses, bacteria like Strep and Staph and cold viruses and ILIs and the like and goodness knows what else. I don't spend my life trying to keep my body clear of those things, I simply live with them in the comfort that my body's own immune system is highly competent and able to deal with them and has done my entire life. So for me, the number of Covid cases out there is really matterless. What matters is how Covid affects an individual and in this respect of course there are huge differences between people. It varies by gender, ethnicity, age, state of health and other factors. Hence some people are at significantly more risk than others. Those who are at significant risk should obviously take every precaution they can to protect themselves and to boost their own immune systems whether it be for Covid-19 or for Flu or anything else. There's a plethora of things one can do to boost one's immune system and a plethora of things to avoid doing that will damage the immune system. Down to individuals to be bothered enough to learn what those things are and to implement them in their lives.
Josho said:
Out of the reported cases, I think it's around about 9% of the entire US population, but this as we know would not be accurate as many Americans also struggled to get a test or maybe even didn't want the test, the real total percentage is a higher than the recorded number of covid-19 cases.
It's fairly well established now I think that the real number of Covid cases that have occurred is many multiples of the very limited number of confirmed cases that governments tell us about as a result of their limited testing of the population. Universities and scientists have told us the true number is between 10 times and 20 times the number of confirmed cases. Do the math.