04/16/2021
As I see patients in clinic I always (usually) ask people if they have been vaccinated against COVID-19. Most have been vaccinated or they are working on it. Some people report not being vaccinated and no plans to get vaccinated.
I then talk to them and explain the recommendation that most people should be vaccinated to fight the virus. Often, I probably talk too much as maybe I am too passionate about the topic. Sorry about that!
One argument that I hear against the vaccine is that the CDC's Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) reporting database currently contains data documenting the ~1000 people that have died "after" receiving the COVID-19 vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna.
Let me address this. Yes, ~1000 people have apparently died. But the database does not contain any information that would suggest the people died "because" they received the vaccine. As an example, there was one person who was in a car wreck, later received the vaccine, and then later died. The database does not report why the patient died. Was it related to complications from the car wreck?
Let's stop for a second and do the math. Let's suppose the deaths could be 100% attributed to the vaccines (none can be attributed to the vaccine, but let's suppose). That would be 1000 deaths / 90 million people receiving at least 1 dose of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines.
Possible vaccine mortality rate of 1000/90,000,000 = 0.0011%
Using round numbers, 550,000 have died in the US from COVID-19 (so far) with a US population of 330,000,000 people.
Current COVID-19 US mortality rate 550,000/330,000,000 = 0.17%
Comparing the two numbers, one is 150 times more likely to die from the COVID-19 virus than from the vaccine. And this assumes that people have actually died from the vaccine which cannot be proven by simply looking at the VAERS database from the CDC.
So please get vaccinated. The odds are in your favor.
In closing let me point out that the mortality rate for COVID-19 is higher in patients who are older. Approaches 20% mortality for patients in their 80s and 90s. And the majority of the 90,000,000 people that have been vaccinated are "older".
If one assumes even a 1% COVID-19 mortality rate in the population of people that have so far received the vaccines, then the odds of dying from the virus vs the vaccines approaches 900x.
Which means the odds of dying from the virus are much, much higher than 150x when compared to the odds of dying from the vaccine. And we don't know yet that anybody has even died from the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines!!!
So please get vaccinated. For you and for your contribution to herd immunity.
Yes, I am passionate about this topic.
