The vaccine lottery

A science correspondent in a UK newspaper Undermining the AstraZeneca jab is a dangerous act of political folly wonders why the AstraZeneca vaccine has been subject to 'constant undermining' and considers the vacillation by some countries (regarding the vaccine) to be 'absurd and harmful'.  Rather an emotional response (not to mention unscientific!) to name-call other nations this way.  He worries that the doubts have 'triggered fears' among public health officials in the UK that young women who have raised risks of developing these blood clots may shun the jab. Does foreign coverage on the AZ vaccine now need to include a trigger warning for UK health officials?

It isn’t AstraZeneca that is hurt (you can’t emotionally 'hurt' a company) it is the individuals, the scientists in Oxford University, whose feelings are hurt by the fall out of the vaccine they had initiated in their labs possibly not being as safe as the others on the market.

The elephant in the room is that you elect to take a vaccine; it is not medicine; it is an option to take preventative medicine. And if this preventative medicine, in a very very tiny number of cases, could kill you would you still take that risk?  And if the tiny risk is a bit higher if you happen to be a younger woman, and a bit higher again if you are a younger woman on a certain contraceptive medicine that increases your risk of blood clots, would you still take that risk?

The risks of taking the AstraZeneca vaccine far outweigh the risks of not taking it because the chance of dying by blood clot from the disease are worse that the chance of dying by blood clot from the vaccine. Happy days for the W.H.O. et al who have to think in the aggregate and steer the geo-politics.  But if there is a correlation, the people who were given the vaccine and died because of it, are collateral damage. Like an innocent bystander who dies when a cluster bomb is dropped.
 
Suppose there is a causality between the vaccine and blood clots (albeit rarely occurring) you could compare the risks of taking the AZ vaccine to the chances of your cluster of numbers winning the lottery. The government is asking millions of people to play the vaccine lottery while reassuring them they won’t win; except for in a very, very, very, very few, who will hit the jackpot (of death). 

​There is a chance to minimise the collateral damage and Germany has taken it by giving the AZ vaccine only to the over sixties and also, extraordinarily, by allowing their citizens a choice of vaccine. 

I would love a choice if I was given one. And if it meant waiting anther few months or even a year, I’d take it.

This is a personal opinion written by Alison Hackett, posted 7 April 2021. Please acknowledge this source if quoting from the article.