Tag: vaccines

Ohio’s Vaccine Lottery Didn’t Increase COVID-19 Vaccination Rate, Study Says. Governor Disputes.

Many states offered incentives for residents to get the COVID-19 vaccine when it became available to anyone over the age of 16. One of the most well-known incentives was found in Ohio, which created a Vax-A-Million lottery that would enter people who obtained the COVID-19 vaccine into a lottery for $1 million. Children who were vaccinated would be entered into a drawing for a full-ride scholarship to attend one of Ohio’s state universities.

But a new study suggests the lottery didn’t increase the state’s vaccination rate any more than states that did not offer a similar lottery, Fox 8 reported. The study, conducted by Boston University’s School of Medicine, compared vaccination rates in Ohio with some states that offered no such incentive. It found that Ohio did see an increase in vaccinations after the lottery was announced – but other states saw a similar spike around the same time because the eligibility for the Pfizer vaccine was expanded to include those added 12 to 15.

Dan Tierney, spokesperson for Gov. Mike DeWine (R-OH), suggested the study was flawed for focusing on the expanded age group. Tierney said the state had already removed the younger age group when it compiled data on the lottery in order to tout its success.

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HHS Secretary Becerra: ‘It Is Absolutely The Government’s Business’ To Know Who’s Been Vaccinated Against COVID-19

Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra fired back at critics of the Biden administration’s plan to go door-to-door promoting the COVID-19 vaccine by insisting that it is “absolutely the government’s business” to know who has gotten the shot.

The Biden administration announced, earlier this week, that they would be putting together “strike forces” charged with going “door-to-door” to convince vaccine-hesitant populations to get the jab. Speaking to a press conference, Biden touted the plan as a community-by-community public health push: “Now, we need to go to community-by-community, neighborhood-by-neighborhood, and oftentimes, door-to-door — literally knocking on doors — to get help to the remaining people protected from the virus.”

But the plan met with sharp, swift criticism on social media and from Republican legislators, who blasted the Biden administration for believing it is the government’s job to check up on people’s private healthcare decisions.

“How about don’t knock on my door,” Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) fired back at the president Tuesday night. “You’re not my parents. You’re the government. Make the vaccine available, and let people be free to choose. Why is that concept so hard for the left?”

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The Great Big ‘Delta’ Scariant

Why the Delta scare?

As a virus mutates, it becomes more contagious and less lethal. And then eventually it mostly disappears. Many voices claim that Delta will be with us for a very long time, but we should be so lucky. It’s way more likely that it will soon be followed by a next variant that will in turn become dominant. And more contagious and less lethal.

And no, that’s not because of unvaccinated people, or at least there’s no logic in that. If most people are not vaccinated, the virus has no reason to mutate. If many people are, it does. So this CNN piece is suspect. Vaccinated people are potential variant factories, just as much, if and when the vaccines used don’t stop them from being infectious, as the present vaccines don’t, far as we know.

Unvaccinated People Are “Variant Factories,” Infectious Diseases Expert

Unvaccinated people do more than merely risk their own health. They’re also a risk to everyone if they become infected with coronavirus, infectious disease specialists say. That’s because the only source of new coronavirus variants is the body of an infected person. “Unvaccinated people are potential variant factories,” Dr. William Schaffner, a professor in the Division of Infectious Diseases at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, told CNN Friday. “The more unvaccinated people there are, the more opportunities for the virus to multiply,” Schaffner, a professor in the Division of Infectious Diseases at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, said. “When it does, it mutates, and it could throw off a variant mutation that is even more serious down the road.”

“Even more serious”? Well, yes, it can become more contagious, but then it loses lethality. Maybe that’s what we want. Maybe we want a virus that everyone can be infected by, and build resistance to, without serious consequences. Maybe that’s even what we should aim for. And also, maybe that’s what we already have, with survival rates of 99.99% among most people.

And maybe, just maybe, a one-dimensional “solution” in the shape of an experimental vaccine is the worst response of all. Because it doesn’t protect from anything other than more severe disease, while unleashing potential adverse effects for decades to come in the inoculated. Maybe one dimension simply doesn’t cut it. Maybe we should not refuse to prevent people from becoming infected, or to treat them in the early stages of the disease.

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Preliminary Findings of mRNA Covid-19 Vaccine Safety in Pregnant Persons

A total of 35,691 v-safe participants 16 to 54 years of age identified as pregnant. Injection-site pain was reported more frequently among pregnant persons than among nonpregnant women, whereas headache, myalgia, chills, and fever were reported less frequently. Among 3958 participants enrolled in the v-safe pregnancy registry, 827 had a completed pregnancy, of which 115 (13.9%) resulted in a pregnancy loss and 712 (86.1%) resulted in a live birth (mostly among participants with vaccination in the third trimester). Adverse neonatal outcomes included preterm birth (in 9.4%) and small size for gestational age (in 3.2%); no neonatal deaths were reported. Although not directly comparable, calculated proportions of adverse pregnancy and neonatal outcomes in persons vaccinated against Covid-19 who had a completed pregnancy were similar to incidences reported in studies involving pregnant women that were conducted before the Covid-19 pandemic. Among 221 pregnancy-related adverse events reported to the VAERS, the most frequently reported event was spontaneous abortion (46 cases).

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Biden to deploy COVID ‘response teams’ to low-vaccination towns nationwide amid Delta variant concerns

President Joe Biden’s administration is sending COVID-19 “response teams” to locations across the United States amid growing concerns surrounding the new highly transmittable Delta variant of the virus, according to a White House official, CNN reported.

Comprised of officials from the U.S. Centers of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the teams will focus on communities with low vaccination rates and a prominent presence of the latest strain.

A White House official said the administration has sent out similar teams before, but none that focused specifically on the Delta variant. The teams, led by the White House coronavirus team, will be tasked with conducting a sharp increase in testing, providing therapeutics, and deploying federal workers to ramp up vaccination distribution.

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Franklin County Judge Including Mandatory Coronavirus Vaccine in Terms of Probation

Common Pleas Judge Richard Frye of Ohio’s Franklin County has been including mandatory coronavirus vaccines in the terms of defendants’ respective probations, attaching the stipulation to three of his recent cases.

“It occurred to me that at least some of these folks need to be encouraged not to procrastinate,” Frye said, according to the Columbus Dispatch, which said the judge openly discussed vaccination statuses with the defendants.

According to reports, none of the defendants cited religious, moral, or medical reasons for not yet getting the vaccine.

“I think it’s a reasonable condition when we’re telling people to get employed and be out in the community,” Frye added.

One of the defendants who received the condition, Cameron Stringer, “entered a guilty plea for one charge of improperly handling firearms in a motor vehicle, for which he was sentenced to two years of probation,” per the Dispatch. A coronavirus shot is one of several conditions of his probation, court documents show.

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