You don't have to "believe" in science. Believing in something means trusting something is true, in absence of evidence. That's at the base of all religions and the opposite of science.

I just trust the scientific process. Yes, the conclusions currently drawn from the evidence can be wrong. I'm not disappointed if it is. If scientists gain new insights, it just means the proces is working.

In this context, I think they mean, believe that the published data is true. You don't have to believe in science itself, but you do have to trust scientists when they report data (you can check the conclusions yourself, but you can't check if the data was accurately reported, if the published protocol was followed etc).

That said, I believe the legal repercussions of lying about these studies will be too high to stomach, so I do trust the companies to be truthful here. That doesn't mean that it is irrational to choose not to trust them.

You don't have to trust a specific company to trust the scientific process. If they lie, we will find out. They don't have a lasting monopoly on that data.

Yes, we will find out eventually, but if you want the vaccine today, you need to trust them today.

Again though, the fact that it is inevitable that we will eventually find out is why I personally believe the data today - I trust the company to not sacrifice long-term credibility for short-term gains.

There is a difference between science and "corporate science". "Corporate science" once said tobacco was healthy for you - doctor recommended cigarettes.

Also science can be corruptible as well. It was once scientific fact that non-whites were inferior to whites. The "father of gynecology" experimented on black women because it was scientific knowledge that black women don't feel pain.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/james-mari...

It was once "science" to cure sick people with leeches. It was once science to give "misbehaving" women hysterectomies or lobotomies. One of the most famous ones being rosemary kennedy.

> If scientists gain new insights, it just means the proces is working.

I guess the victims of mengele and U-731 appreciate your confidence in the "process".

For someone so critical of religion, you have an almost blind and zealous and unquestioning faith in the "scientific process".

When money, corporations and politics are involved, you should be skeptical. Even if it is "science". And pfizer and these companies aren't in the business of science, they are in the business of making money.

Yes. Companies can lie. But your point is buried in the false assumptions about me.

"Trusting something" !== "An almost blind and zealous and unquestioning faith"

Trusting the scientific process doesn't mean you shouldn't be skeptical. It means the opposite. If a company lies, we will find out eventually. You can look at the evidence. There will be independent data eventually. You don't need "faith".

Why you needed to involve Mengele to make an argument is beyond me. Invoking Godwin's law will never help you win a discussion.

I personally like to read primary sources and I trust Pfizer and other Pharmaceutical companies to not lie in their research findings. I believe in my own ability to read and draw my own conclusions and I trust Pfizer’s own fear of a lawsuit.

This might be completely obvious but can Pfizer be sued if there is an EUA?

Should have clarified, the reason why I am asking is because my understanding is that under usual circumstances it is the government that pays out for vaccine damages. Does the same apply in the case of an EUA? [1] https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2019/05/vaccine-s...

I'm surprised you're so cynical to the point you don't trust anyone

I'm not - the government's messaging throughout the whole pandemic has been "get back to work, peon". There is absolutely no reason to believe that the two vaccines aren't more of the same. You need to work with accurate priors.

I'm not sure how the government's messaging during the pandemic affects a private company, with global shareholders, claiming efficacy of a product whose results will be plain to see for all of those shareholders. You cannot lie about your products in an open market and be successful.

Sure, we should be skeptical of the government line on the pandemic, but why should we be skeptical of a product that comes from a company whose product must work for them to make money?

I think instead of letting our previous biases in one arena influence our current decision making in another, we should look at the evidence, make an independent decision, and then loop back on that when the evidence changes. Government bad != private company creates product that doesn't work

There is no reason to believe in long-term safety, neither is there reason to believe in long-term efficacy, the vaccine is too new for that to have any good data, meanwhile the manufacturers are indemnified to the hilt. Not that there's anything wrong with vaccine indemnification, when the product is proven safe and improves public health, as the vaccines on the markets all are, but this one was rushed through at unprecedented speed.

And what's with the trust in the market to fix things? The 737-MAX crashes did not affect Boeing share price or Boeing management in any meaningful way, neither are safety problems with the new covid vaccines going to affect Pfizer or Moderna.

The vaccines on the market went through the same trial process as these new ones, just that these new ones did it quicker.

What are you going to do for a "few years"? The potential long-term side effects from covid far outweigh the potential side-effects of a well-tested vaccine.

> I am surprised so many people are suddenly in full "believe the science" mode

Two reasons:

1. We want our lives back. Covid sucks and people are getting tired of the precautions. Many of us are still being careful to protect others, but "covid fatigue" is very real. A vaccine promises tangible light at the end of this tunnel.

2. While many of the efficacy trials are shorter than normal, there's no reason to believe that these vaccines are dangerous. mRNA ones, in particular, basically can't give patients the virus itself, unlike many other kinds of vaccines.

For a healthy young adult, what are the potential long term side effects of covid? For most healthy young adults it is a mild flu in terms of symptoms. I know there is a minor risk of having a worse case, but the odds of that for young adults with healthy BMIs is low. I'll take the vaccine when it is available but I understand that others are looking at the risk/reward and being distrustful of a vaccine. Particularly when the vaccines have been rushed and have unknown long term effects

> For a healthy young adult, what are the potential long term side effects of covid?

From an overall risk/reward perspective, I would include the risk of subsequently infecting your parents, grandparents or other vulnerable/high-risk family/friends with severe disease as a 'potential long term side effect' of covid in a young/low-risk individual.

Note though that it isn't clear at this point to what extent the vaccine confers sterilizing immunity.

I know some healthy young people who have a much harder time exercising months after getting the virus, but I concede that those cases are fairly rare—although much more common than any issues from vaccines in trial.

Thinking about it from a societal perspective, I'm willing to take a small risk from getting the vaccine to avoid inadvertently getting and spreading the virus to more vulnerable people like my grandparents.

What is the rational risk/reward that shows the vaccine is more dangerous than the disease?

There's some decent evidence of long-term (permanently?) lowered VO2Max in a large proportion of cases in younger people, along with lower quality evidence of prevalence of scarier post-infective consequences. I don't really want even a minor case of COVID-19.

Yes, the vaccines may be riskier than we're accustomed to. GBS is a 1 per million side effect in most vaccines, with some proportion of these people having permanent side effects. I wouldn't be surprised if we find that these vaccines are more like 1 in 25k. But that's better than the odds even young people face from COVID-19.

I'm thinking of not rushing out to get vaccinated right away.

(1) My company switched to work from home two or three years ago, I've just recently subscribed to Walmart+ so I've got free grocery delivery for a year, I've gotten into the habit of making my own meals which is healthier and cheaper than how I ate pre-COVID so I'm going to stick with that even after COVID is gone, and my socializing was almost all online before COVID.

It is no problem for me to keep mostly quarantined for another year.

(2) The few times in the next year I will have to interact closely with other people will probably be with people who have taken it (e.g., doctors and dentists).

(3) While it is true that mRNA vaccines cannot give you the thing they are vaccinating against, it is still possible they will have other side effects. As far as I know there is no way to determine the long term risk of a medicine other than just waiting to see.

(4) I live in a county that has not been hit hard.

(5) It looks like there are at least two vaccines that are going to get quick approval, and I believe there are more deeply into their phase 3 tests.

Putting this all together, it seems I personally have a pretty low chance of getting COVID, and if I do get it a pretty low chance of spreading it while I'm still asymptotic, so can afford to wait and see if any of the vaccines have longer term issues or if one of them is clearly better than the others.

How far out are you drawing the line? You mention another year so it's gonna suck more in an ironic sense for you if side effects come out 2, 5, 20 years from now.

I'll be the first in the queue personally. Lets get back outside, even I'm bored of these walls now.

> I'll be the first in the queue personally. Lets get back outside, even I'm bored of these walls now.

Excellent! That is exactly what I want. The more people who take it because they are either at high risk, or because avoiding exposure seriously harms their lifestyle, the more data there will be for me when I decide to take it.

As far as side effects go, the kind of things that take years to show up are usually things that you'd only see in a medicine that you have to take regularly.

The latest research suggests that we probably get long term COVID immunity. Those few cases of people getting it twice were probably people who got a small viral load the first time and didn't develop strong immunity.

All the COVID vaccines look like they will be take once (or take twice over a short period) and that's it, so we almost certainly won't see anything like people developing cancer from it 5 years later. Those things take times to build up, like say we had with Actos and bladder cancer, with each time you take it adding to the risk.

If there are long term bad effects from the COVID vaccines, the underlying damage will happen within a couple weeks or so of taking them, and then should start being detectable in the health statistics of people who took it versus people who did not within a year.

Thus, at the latest we should know about any long term effects by the time my Walmart+ subscription is up for renewal, which is perfect timing.

Have a plan and stick to it! Sounds good!

Good points regarding the build up, thanks for the response

It seems like tzs is some kind of basement dweller who would prefer to never leave the house even in the absence of a pandemic, in which case holding off on the vaccine does seem like the optimal move.

You're allowed to be excited about things that later may turn out incorrect. This is big news. Good news. Celebrate!

If we're wrong we can be disappointed about it later

My general rule is that I will not take any vaccine which has active patents. If doctors are recommending it way past the patents have expired, it is very likely that it fares well in terms of risk/reward.

A few years? Just say what you mean: "I'm not going to take it"