When and whether to get a COVID booster should depend on your health status, risk tolerance, timing of last infection and other personal factors, experts say.
  • sovietknuckles [they/them]@hexbear.netEnglish
    35·
    9 months ago

    Yes

    What if I’m young and healthy? Do I really need another booster?

    The short answer is: probably not, as long as you don’t mind being sick for a week or two.

    Never mind permanent neurological effects like long COVID, and increasing your risk of stroke or heart attack, even in young and healthy people (my 31-year-old, healthy boss had a stroke the first time they got COVID before getting vaccinated, no prior history of strokes), and depleting your immune system so that getting sick with anything in the next 2 years is more severe.

    Many people get an annual flu shot, not to avoid death but because they don’t want to miss work or life or be miserable for a few weeks. The same is true for COVID-19.

    COVID is just like the flu, bro. Trust me, bro

    • Maoo [none/use name]@hexbear.netEnglish
      8·
      9 months ago

      They’re just publishing advice that’s the exact opposite of public health science. Apathy and zero guidance is already making it so that very few people are getting the boosters but they feel the need to actively make things worse.

  • edric@lemm.eeEnglish
    10·
    9 months ago

    It should be treated as an annual shot now. We just got ours last week together with the flu vaccine. 5th covid shot in total. Arms were sore and had a slight fever for a day, then I was all good. Didn’t even need to take a tylenol for the fever.

  • Venus [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
    8·
    9 months ago
    1. Yes
    2. Go do it
    3. Right now
    4. That wasn’t a request
    5. See point 1
    6. Covid is way worse than anything the vaccine can do to you
    7. You afraid of a lil poke or what, baby?
  • Veganhydride [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
    5·
    9 months ago

    The fact that vaccines help prevent the spread of disease is offhandedly mentioned at the very end. This is so wild. Isn’t herd immunity a concept most people understand? That vaccines aren’t just about you personally?

    I’m not high-risk at all and I got my latest booster a few weeks back - upon learning this very shocking fact my GP asked me why in a pretty judgmental way. Same deal when I had to jump through hoops to get my previous booster even though the official government policy in my country was that anyone could get it. Different pharmacies had different interpretations of this very clear policy though and nobody agreed.

    I don’t live in constant fear of what COVID will do to me personally, but the vibe I get from practicing health workers I interact with is that I’m weird for caring about getting vaccinated and it’s getting to me. Like, am I wrong? I don’t think I am.

    • Beaver [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
      6·
      9 months ago

      Isn’t herd immunity a concept most people understand?

      Unfortunately, that term has been redefined in the public mind as “everyone gets sick and dies”

    • Razzazzika@lemm.eeEnglish
      4·
      9 months ago

      Nah people in the US are just selfish as fuck. Sadly it’s the culture. Go somewhere like Japan where the culture is in favor of society instead of the individual and you’ll find nearly everyone vaccinated.

      • Veganhydride [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
        3·
        9 months ago

        I live in France.

        Looks like 81% of the US population got at least 1 dose, and 17% got an updated (bivalent) booster dose.

        81% of the French population got at least 1 dose, and 56% got a booster.

        Wack. But I was talking about the attitude of the doctors and pharmacists I’ve met.