News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:Johnson and Johnson single-shot vaccine appears 66% effec... by neuronic on Friday January 29, 2021 @07:09PM (#25964577)
Please, stop posting smart sounding misinformation.

> mRNA technology is new, but not unknown. They have been studied for more than a decade. mRNA vaccines do not contain a live virus and do not carry a risk of causing disease in the vaccinated person. mRNA from the vaccine never enters the nucleus of the cell and does not affect or interact with a person's DNA.

https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/covid-19/hcp/mrna-vaccine-basic...

Re:Johnson and Johnson single-shot vaccine appears 66% effec... by dnautics on Friday January 29, 2021 @07:12PM (#25964602)
I have a phd in biochemistry. I can tell you this is categorically wrong: "mRNA from the vaccine never enters the nucleus of the cell and does not affect or interact with a person's DNA"

It should say almost never. It's low enough for the risk to be worth it, but posting actually wrong absolute statements risks causing a backlash, the last year should have taught us all this basic condition of humanity

Re:Johnson and Johnson single-shot vaccine appears 66% effec... by schrodinger on Friday January 29, 2021 @11:42PM (#25966150)
Agreed that accuracy is important, and we're in sort of a safe space here on Hacker News, but at the same time I feel that the media's portrayal of vaccines so far has done us a disservice. "only 66% effective" may be accurate, but if it's 100% effective against hospitalization that should be the lede. It's also true that we have not proven that vaccines prevent asymptomatic spread, but that's not the same as saying they don't; they almost definitely do, and by being "scientifically accurate" we give rise to people thinking "hmm, this vaccine is only slightly better than a coin flip and I can still spread, what's the point." That's NOT TRUE! Again, all of these vaccines are nearly 100% effective against serious infection and almost definitely inhibit spread—that should be the headline!!!