COVID Vaccine Poll

While I've had my first I can understand people who haven't. I can't say a rushed set of 'vaccines' exactly fills me with a massive amount of trust in it, especially as the testing of it was so lax just to get ready that we went from basically being told there were no serious side effects to an ever-growing list of potentially serious side effects and we don't know what else may end up being ann issue down the line that they aren't really known right now. I mean I got back from mine only to see it then reported that the Moderna one I was giving was now being linked to myocarditis and pericarditis. When there is already a vaccine hesitancy amongst some people then that doesn't really help as you just can't make an informed decision on the risk as they don't have anywhere near the full data to provide people.

Also, it may be different in other areas but if you are like me and have a phobia of needles the process doesn't really help. I had hoped when it was my time my Doctor would contact me like they did my parents as it was easy for them, they were contacted a few days before, given a time, they arrived and 5 minutes later they were out. That's as problematic as possible if you have a phobia of anything related to having an injection. My age group came and nothing, a month later I got my NHS letter and they were another age range down by that point, a month after that a second letter and they were now multiple age ranges past me and my Doctor hadn't contacted me and they wouldn't let me book one when I phoned up as they apparently have to schedule them. And my nearest mass vaccination centres that ever had slots was going a county over in Stoke (That's nearly a big enough reason not to book). And you had to book 10 days in advance giving more time for fear to build. So that basically meant around about an hours journey for my mind to go over and over about it, despite having a set time that didn't matter, there were people in front of me whose bookings were anywhere from 30mins to over an hour after mine, and I had arrived 10mins early so it took about 45min of my anxiety getting worse, at one point I checked my fitness band and it was reporting a heartbeat of 110 which is massively elevated. Ultimately there is a massive amount of streamlining that could be to help those who are hesitant for phobia reasons, Doctors need to be more on top of bookings for people who haven't booked at a mass vaccination centre as there is a decent chance its apprehension that is stopping them and they need to not only have way more slots in some local mass vaccination centres and when you are given slot and you arrive that slot should actually matter. The easier the process is the easier it is to persuade people to have it, there will still be people who perhaps their phobia is significantly worse than mine who would still refuse even if it was the easiest process going but I can certainly understand why many don't turn up for their second dose after the experience from the first

 

You say that but phobias are different to just fear, you don't just get over phobias 'by manning up'. For example with myself, I can't even watch people getting an injection on TV, it's completely irrational, its not even caused by any trauma like some peoples phobias are because the only bad experience with an injection I have had (my BCG really didn't go well, almost 2 months after everyone else scab and pain had gone mine was still there and hurting) came well after the phobia existed. I could have to have an injection every day and that phobia probably wouldn't go away, the best I could probably do would learn to control it enough to dull it via therpy. It's like some people can be anxious going out into crowds but others have agoraphobia and just the thought of going out can cause them to break down, same with heights, plenty of people don't like heights and get uneasy walking over something high but those with Acrophobia is worse than that

 

Doesn't help that even though we are learning more it seems almost a weekly occurrence where a new side-effect gets announced. I don't think we have the J&J one approved in the UK yet but I saw the FDA announced that can case some Neurological condition.

Hopefully, it turns out that the only issues are these fairly rare ones but I really won't be surprised if in 5-20 years time we find out it's causing an 80% uptick in things like cancer or Alzheimers or that we end up with a Handmaids Tale situation where the fertility rate goes through the floor (And you just know the US will take the wrong message from it and think, that's a perfect way to combat fertility issues lol). After all, figures show that in the US it takes an average of 4.2 years for drugs that get FDA approval to get it but also that 1 in 3 of them later get pulled because they get found to be unsafe in the long run and that's without all those that were highly promising but fall at the last hurdle as safety issues come to light. If proper stringent testing and approval processes have such a failure rate then it certainly does mean something rushed and given exceptions on reaching the normal bar for acceptance could have issues we won't be aware of for years or decades

 

It might have been Sarah Gilbert.

Yes, the money thrown at the vaccines has been huge and there are many other vaccines and medical advances that could be advanced if they had similar amounts of money thrown at them.

The other main reason, for the speed with which the vaccine was developed, was the overlapping of the 3 main stages of the trials.