I feel like the efficacy is debatable. It reduces severe symptoms but more and more vaccinated are contracting it daily even in places of 95+% vaccinated so there's a good dialogue to be had here

> It reduces severe symptoms but more and more vaccinated are contracting it daily even in places of 95+% vaccinated

That's what the world living with COVID looks like. Given the Delta's estimated reproduction number (5~8), there's no herd immunity achievable in a near future. Then make it less severe and transmissible so we can handle it without strict lockdown and overloading public health infrastructure. At least until we get a universal vaccine against COVID.

Uh yeah, when more people are vaccinated, a greater percentage that get it will be vaccinated.

The original hope was that vaccinated people wouldn't get it at all, as per any other vaccine. Delta proved for this to not to be the case, unfortunately.

> The original hope was that vaccinated people wouldn't get it at all, as per any other vaccine

This is false. No vaccine provides 100% protection. Even MMR, one of the most battle-tested vaccine provides ~97% protection against measles and ~88% against mumps.

https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/vpd/mmr/public/index.html

If you get higher than 70% efficacy then it's usually considered very helpful for public health. Last year, we were not even sure if we can get 50% efficacy (a borderline for approval) but it turns out that COVID vaccines are so effective that it even works reasonably well for variants, with a caveat of diminishing effects over time.

>it turns out that COVID vaccines are so effective that it even works reasonably well for variants

As per this CDC[1] report - "Two doses of mRNA vaccines were 74.7% effective against infection among nursing home residents early in the vaccination program (March–May 2021). During June–July 2021, when B.1.617.2 (Delta) variant circulation predominated, effectiveness declined significantly to 53.1%."

Exactly as I originally commented and you deemed false, due to the Delta variant, we observed an efficacy level (53.1%) considerably lower than any other modern vaccines. I'm not sure what's controversial about the statement that it's obvious that the COVID vaccines are unforunately not working nearly as well as we were originally told that they would.

[1]https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7034e3.htm

Vaccine efficacy on the Delta variant is still a debatable topic, and it's dangerous to make any conclusion from a single reference limited to a very specific, narrow subset of sample.

You probably remember Israel's report (which is strongly motivated to promote booster shots) indicated that vaccine's efficacy was pretty low, but it turns out to be a textbook case of Simpson's paradox[1] from extremely biased vaccination rate.

From what I saw from KDCA's daily reports (which performs extensive contact tracing with a pretty high coverage, not even remotely comparable to the US), it's more of 70% protection against Delta. Though it's possible that its efficacy is waning over time, which may explain the gap between Korea and Israel.

[1] https://www.covid-datascience.com/post/israeli-data-how-can-...

careful, you are getting close to spreading misinformation here...

Meanwhile, news just in: Slovenia apparently suspended today the use of JnJ, after the death of a 20yo in the past hours, «...until all details related to this case are clarified» (Health Minister Janez Poklukar)¹.

And I have difficulties in matching this piece of news with the reported words of Matt Halprin: «YouTube will take down videos that claim such vaccines are dangerous».

And also wonder if this (possible) case fits within the «rare side effects that are recognized by health authorities» (the policy).

¹https://www.euronews.com/2021/09/29/slovenia-temporarily-sus...

this is legitimately dystopian. only can mention side effects that have been "recognized by health authorities" ? how would whistleblowing even be possible in this environment?

Misinformation should be put out in sunlight or else the public may lose the ability to think critically in some respects. Then they’ll be dependent on these companies to steer dialogue and be truth-tellers.

The thing is, youtube is crappy place for "whistle blowing" because video is a terrible medium for people evaluating information critically - any references a video might have will slip by a person, the general demeanor of a presenter can matter more than their content or credentials, etc.

It's not unreasonable for youtube to refuse non-mainstream health theories even if those theories deserve an airing somewhere.

>video is a terrible medium for people evaluating information critically

yes, but this is the world we live in currently. getting information from the "factual" videos will still be encouraged

> Also, the policy states some exceptional cases such as countervailing views with a support from medical experts, firsthand experiences, etc.

its obvious that contrary opinions will be banned first with option to appeal coming after. im sure that will be a totally open and transparent process.

Also useful the (consistent) Axios summary:

https://www.axios.com/youtube-anti-vax-misinformation-vaccin...

Normally I'd be opposed to censorship in general, but in this case I'm kind of glad, but only because shit like this is actually happening even now: https://www.rte.ie/news/ireland/2021/0927/1249210-covid-pati...

AFAIC, anything they can do to suppress the raving lunacy of people like the ones who convinced that poor man to leave hospital, may he rest in peace, is a good thing in my book.