Lisa Miller, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus
Calculating your risk of death or hospitalization if you are infected with the coronavirus requires good data – notably, the total number of infections in the US. Unfortunately, that data is fuzzy.
Vaccine hesitancy is often met with one of two responses: Ridicule, or factual information. Both assume a failure of reason, but human behaviour is more complex than reason, so both responses fail.
The Novavax COVID vaccine is now available in Australia. What makes it different from the other vaccines? And why are some people waiting for it to get vaccinated?
After two years of COVID-19, it’s understandable that many people are weary of infection prevention measures. But simply being tired of the pandemic is no reason to let our guard down.
DNA and mRNA vaccines produce a different kind of immune response than traditional vaccines, allowing researchers to tackle some previously unsolvable problems in medicine.
Vaccine hesitancy may be a waiting game. Even those who said they would never get the COVID-19 vaccine if it were available immediately became more likely to do so when it was available in the future.
If you or your child test positive for COVID, you clearly can’t go to that vaccination or booster appointment you had booked this week. So, when can you go?
We’re reliant on overseas supply - and the many moving parts of delivery. Each of those parts require staff on the ground – and many workers in this system are likely being affected by Omicron.
Instead of assuming that science skeptics are motivated by ignorance, or selfishness, we should listen to them and try to understand and address their actual concerns.
Through lockdowns, vaccine mandates and the spectre of mass death, the pandemic has uprooted our lives and challenged us to think differently about ethics. What might the future hold?
Dean Faculty of Health Sciences and Professor of Vaccinology at University of the Witwatersrand; and Director of the SAMRC Vaccines and Infectious Diseases Analytics Research Unit, University of the Witwatersrand