COVID is far more dangerous than the COVID vaccine.
A Guest Post report.
Everything has risks, and we quantify them. A "micromort" is a one-in-a-million chance of dying from some activity. The average American has a baseline risk of about one micromort per day of dying from some accidental cause.
Comparisons with other risks put things into perspective.
Skydiving is seven micromorts, each jump. Going under general anesthesia is five micromorts, each time. Giving childbirth in the USA is 210 micromorts. Back in March-May, 2020, at the height of COVID deaths, there were 24,000 more deaths in New York City than usual. People were experiencing 50 micromorts per day of risk from COVID--about twice the risk of dying as serving in Afghanistan at its most dangerous. https://www.nytimes.com
Forbes, in an article in October, 2020, back when they estimated the risks if U.S. deaths were to get to 225,000, calculated that a person age 70 or older who got COVID had the same risk of dying as someone climbing Mt. Everest--i.e. 54,000 micromorts. For a 20-year-old getting COVID had the same risk as driving a car 7,500 miles, i.e. 30 micromorts. https://www.forbes.com |
| Eliot Nierman |
Guest Post by Eliot Nierman
For a while I have somewhat facetiously commented that the major risk of a COVID vaccine is driving to the vaccine site. I finally decided to actually do a more quantitative assessment of whether this was true. I used the worst possible numbers for the COVID vaccine- 1 in a million dying. While this may be the case for the subgroup of women age 20 to 50 who got clotting issues with the J&J vaccine, it is not true for the broad population who get vaccinated. They have a much lower risk of death if any. The risks of any major other complication are similarly tiny.More importantly, this analysis ignores the fact that the net death rate from vaccination is actually negative since the vaccine is so good at protecting from death from covid. 97% of those very sick and likely a similar percent of those dying from covid have not been vaccinated. Right now the chances of dying in the US of COVID if you are not vaccinated is about 1 in a million each day! The chances of dying from driving are about 1 in a million every 3 days.
To sum up, the worst case scenario (greatly overestimating vaccine risk and not including any benefit) is that the chances of dying from the vaccine is 1/2 that of the chances of dying from driving your car for a week. Importantly, you only get vaccinated once so your chances of dying from a covid vaccine are less than 1% that of dying from driving in a year. Your chance of dying from COVID in a year, if you are not vaccinated, is 3 times that of driving for a year and 300 times that of dying from the vaccine! Other serious risks of the vaccine are similarly tiny compared with driving and even worse covid itself.
And remember I am markedly overestimating the risk of the vaccine. I suspect that the risk of the vaccine is actually less than one thousandth the risk of COVID! So if you are worried about dangers from the vaccine, don’t drive for 3 days and you will be ahead in terms of risk. Or would you rather go back to mask wearing?
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8 comments:
Wait a second, there’s going to be math on this test??
The problem is the sad state of math literacy in our country. Start bandying numbers around and brains lose focus. Anecdotal evidence is convincing to the math illiterate - quantitative analysis is not. This applies to vaccines, climate change, economic policy, criminal justice, whatever. The solution to so many of society’s problems, in my estimation, is education. The fewer of our fellow citizens who are math literate, the easier it is for them to be fooled into voting against their interests. Watch Republicans fight against Biden’s plans for free pre K and community college.
The vaccine resistant created their own “factually” incorrect belief system that can’t be overcome with logic. It’s like trying to tell a Trump supporter that he is a liar when they believe he is a truth teller. If only our political discord could be resolved with logic, facts. How many Trump supporters have changed their minds from reading this post?
A Great Culling of the MAGA Cult is about to happen! The culling has begun in the South and the deep-red states. No age group is protected. I believe Donald Trump looked at the numbers on CoVid cases in New York City, Seattle, and LA an assumed “CoVid is killing Democrats and people of color.” There was no plan the aid the cities as mayors and Governors cried out for a Federal response. The vaccine Operation Warp Speed was intended for rich white people if you read the thoughts of Steven Miller. Now, with the vaccine, those that are fully vaccinated are protected from the worse effects of CoVid but the fallout from a raging infection currently in uptick is evidence of their own limited capacity to see beyond their daily experience. The Trumpists did not see Donald Trump get the vaccination therefore it did not happen. Donald Trump survived a CoVid infection so why worry? And the Fox News claim that vaccination programs are an attack on your personal freedom and therefore unconstitutional. We, again, stand at the abyss as variants evolve and spread more efficiently they will again infect us all, or not. That is the gamble and the ever present risk.
Both my son and his wife got Covid last year. Now, they claim they are immune from the disease. I haven't seen anywhere whether that's true or not. Also, she claims that she wants to get pregnant again, but is afraid of the vaccine.
I would just like to hear some advice from an expert as what they should do.
Ya know, I think that the 30% who are consistently irrational have this belief that they are the ones who will beat the odds, and that delusion drives their behavior. It's the same belief that has them lining up every day to buy lottery tickets and spending their weekends at Seven Feathers. Conversely, they also believe they will be the one out of millions who will suffer an adverse effect from the vaccine, which is corollary to the same belief that they will not get sick and die from COVID.
One of the most popular memes involves the statement that the bad reactions from the vaccine are purposely and malevolently underreported which speaks to their paranoia.
Can one convince someone in this mindset of actual reality? I don't think so. Their brain chemistry is so out of whack that they are actually experiencing a completely different reality, with a baseline that's a rejection of the common experience.
The actual truth don't matter; they just know what they feel is real. And, oh boy, are they vulnerable to the unscrupulous who will pander to them.
To Peter C who wants some advisefrom an expert This from the Centers For Disease Control regarding immunity after being sick:
you should be vaccinated regardless of whether you already had COVID-19. That’s because experts do not yet know how long you are protected from getting sick again after recovering from COVID-19. Even if you have already recovered from COVID-19, it is possible—although rare—that you could be infected with the virus that causes COVID-19 again. Studies have shown that vaccination provides a strong boost in protection in people who have recovered from COVID-19. Learn more about why getting vaccinated is a safer way to build protection than getting infected.
This regarding getting pregnant, again from the CDC:
Pregnant and recently pregnant people are more likely to get severely ill with COVID-19 compared with non-pregnant people. If you are pregnant, you can receive a COVID-19 vaccine. Getting a COVID-19 vaccine during pregnancy can protect you from severe illness from COVID-19. If you have questions about getting vaccinated, a conversation with your healthcare provider might help, but is not required for vaccination.
Pregnant and Recently Pregnant People Are at Increased Risk for Severe Illness from COVID-19
Although the overall risk of severe illness is low, pregnant and recently pregnant people are at an increased risk for severe illness from COVID-19 when compared with non-pregnant people. Severe illness includes illness that requires hospitalization, intensive care, or a ventilator or special equipment to breathe, or illness that results in death. Additionally, pregnant people with COVID-19 are at increased risk of preterm birth and might be at increased risk of other adverse pregnancy outcomes compared with pregnant women without COVID-19.
Rick - I wanted to pose a challenge to your idea of rationality. In his book Thinking Fast and Slow, Daniel Kahneman says that we basically flatter ourselves thinking that we are rational beings. I've often wondered how two brilliant and well-educated people can see the same data and come to very different conclusions. Kahneman says it's because we tell ourselves stories about what is real, and we filter all facts to make then fit the story. I see that here in comments here all the time, especially from those who ridicule or are hostile toward religion.
I've spent many years in IT Risk Management, particularly around designing and building data centers that must be on-line 100% of the time. Quantifying and monetizing risk is what we do, but it's easier for insurance underwriters and actuaries because they have big data sets that are statistically robust. Failure rates for data centers is low and we have very little empirical data, so we run simulations (Monte Carlo, Markov, etc...) to come up with statistical probabilities for failures of different designs. When we present different costs and options using these simulations, the executives listen carefully, then start talking about their one experience that determined their reality. All of our data is filtered through their (statistically irrelevant data point) story they've told themselves, even when probability and impact are low.
One of the great things about this blog is Peter's willingness to step outside of his "story" and ask great questions.
I love your columns, Peter, and love most of the comments. Reading the comments makes reading most comments in Josephine County Chat Facebook page seem like talking to an aardvark. Sorry aardvarks; if you knew english it may be that you’d write more intelligent comments than those cretans!
While I agree that most of the material here simply cannot be understood by people whose minds, if any, are closed, One idea that most people should be able to track is “if U.S. deaths were to get to 225,000, it’s calculated that a person age 70 or older who got COVID had the same risk of dying as someone climbing Mt. Everest--i.e. 54,000 micromorts.”.
Since we have recorded 608,000 Covid deaths in USA as of yesterday, I suppose the danger to us old farts (especially those of us significantly older than 70) is now equivalent to climbing Everest almost three times!
No thanks, it’s so much simpler to get vaccinated!
by the way, where did you get your data? I’m sure I’m going to be asked by the “every death recorded today is blamed on Covid nowadays” crowd. (Talk about being math challenged!)
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