Booster Clarion Call: Reasoning With The ‘Other’ Half

It’s probably best if you get a booster shot, US health officials reckon.

“The available data make very clear that protection against SARS-CoV-2 infection begins to decrease over time following the initial doses of vaccination, and in association with the dominance of the Delta variant, we are starting to see evidence of reduced protection against mild and moderate disease,” Rochelle Walensky, Anthony Fauci and a host of other top government doctors said Wednesday. “Based on our latest assessment, the current protection against severe disease, hospitalization, and death could diminish in the months ahead, especially among those who are at higher risk or were vaccinated during the earlier phases of the vaccination rollout,” the statement added.

That latter bit is somewhat disconcerting. A key tenet of rosy economic forecasts for the US is the notion that the vaccines — and particularly the mRNA shots — will help keep hospitalizations and fatalities low in vaccinated individuals even as infections rise and breakthrough cases become more prevalent. This week, Texas Governor Greg Abbott tested positive.

Although nowhere near the pace seen during the winter wave (when as many as 4,150 people died in a single day), the seven-day average of daily deaths from COVID in the US has more than doubled (figure below).

This is becoming more and more difficult to countenance considering most of the deaths are ostensibly preventable.

As noted here on Tuesday evening (in the linked article above), hospital deaths in some hotspots appear to be back at peaks seen during previous waves, even as the daily death toll remains comparatively low at the national level.

Wednesday’s statement from DHHS explicitly said experts are concerned that the protection against severe disease offered by the vaccines will begin to wane within months. “A booster shot will be needed to maximize vaccine-induced protection and prolong its durability,” the statement said.

When considered in conjunction with proliferating vaccine mandates in the private sector, vaccine requirements for entry into all manner of establishments in large cities, including New York, and, now, a clarion call for booster shots from the nation’s top health officials, the unvaccinated risk becoming totally ostracized — banned from their jobs, barred from participating in public life and three shots behind.

Some will lament that reality. But the more I read (and the more I hear directly from those who refuse to be vaccinated), the more convinced I am that vaccine hesitancy is almost entirely the product of a widespread misinformation campaign and, more broadly, paranoia and divisiveness stoked by the very man who spearheaded the vaccine push and who, just four months ago, allegedly suggested the shots be rebranded with his own name.

In addition to taking a figurative sledgehammer to the foundation on which the country’s democracy was constructed, Donald Trump relegated the last vestiges of civic mindedness in America to the dustbin of history, ironic considering his campaign was built on nostalgia for a bygone era when communities came together to face challenges, as opposed to the current conjuncture, characterized as it is by “neighborly” death threats over something as simple as a five-cent paper mask.

Invariably, the official recommendation for booster shots will increase the temperature on an already boiling, noxious mix of conspiratorial thinking and misplaced libertarianism.

I suppose all I’d say is that nobody is “owning” anyone else by not getting themselves vaccinated. It’s hard to imagine a more ridiculous strategy than “Owning the libs by dying.”

Even more ridiculous is putting children at risk out of allegiance to a political tradition (libertarianism) that the vast majority of Americans screaming about “liberty” don’t know the first thing about. I seriously doubt that even one in a hundred professed libertarians could name a single thinker from the libertarian tradition. If that’s you, then you’ll forgive your fellows if they ask: “What are you thinking? Why would you do this to yourself?”

60% of the US populace had received at least one dose of a vaccine as of Wednesday, when DHHS officially recommended booster shots. 51% were fully vaccinated. The figures for people 65 and over in the US are 91% and 81%, respectively.

Subject to FDA approval, Pfizer and Moderna booster shots will be offered to all Americans beginning the week of September 20 and starting eight months after an individual’s second dose.

In the final paragraph of the press release, Walensky and Fauci tried again to reason with the “other” half. “Nearly all the cases of severe disease, hospitalization, and death continue to occur among those not yet vaccinated at all,” they said.