Only ~14% Of U.S. Adults Have Gotten Latest Covid-19 Vaccine Update

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:People need to get vaccinated. It is the holiday season. Stop the spread for heaven's sake!

The CDC doesn't claim that the booster stops spread/transmission. They only say that it helps protect against serious illness. (Which is very rare anyhow for healthy people post-Omicron.) https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/stay-up-to-date.html

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:CDC stands for center for dumb condescension. Last I checked, these were the idiots who advocated school closures and all manner of useless yet harmful actions. No thanks. They can experiment on some one else’s kid, not mine!

Totally. PCPs also don't want to do this, mine never pushed any shots except checking if kids comply with routine childhood vaccinations needed for school. Doctors have their opinions too and have responsibility to treat patients like individuals based on their risks/benefits, tests, health profile. CDC isn't treating patients.

Yes, this. Asking PCPs to read off talking points to their patients could drive a wedge in the patient-PCP relationship and risks reducing patient trust in the provider if they question the motivation for the recommendation. It's also not clear why providers need talking points; they are already well versed in communicating with their patients.

Some of the CDC talking points for adult patients are odd: '“What have you heard about these vaccines?” “How does that make you feel?”' while the ones compiled by the American Psychological Assoc. are complicated and formulaic:

"Step 2: Ask permission to discuss vaccines
Start by asking permission to discuss vaccines. Say something like, “If it is okay with you, I would like to spend a few minutes talking about COVID-19 vaccines and your family.”
• If the patient says no, respect that.
o Option 1: Move on and say, “I respect that, and because I care about your overall health, maybe we could talk about the vaccines at a future time.”
o Option 2: Based on the patient’s demonstrated emotions and your assessment of the patient’s worldview and values, you could spend several minutes curiously exploring why the patient doesn’t want to talk about it. The goal is to understand, not to change their mind.
Remember: These conversations may take time, and they may continue over multiple visits.
• If the patient says yes to talking about the vaccines, move to Step 3.
• If the patient asks a question about COVID-19 vaccine safety, vaccine risks, or their health or mental health, see potential responses in Step 4."
https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/covid-19/hcp/engaging-patients.html https://www.cdc.gov/respiratory-viruses/tools-resources/downloads/HCP-conversation-guide-508.pdf

[Anonymous]

I've admittedly skipped the prior pages, so maybe someone has already made this post, and I'm 100% all in for vaccinations.

But we need to get to a point where covid vaccines are cyclical and routine like flu shots. This year the flu shot was released earlier, and the new covid booster was hard to come by. Our pediatrician offered many many flu clinics, but since they didn't have the new covid shot, it wasn't available. And for adults that are used to getting the flu shot in October, it required an extra appointment to get the new booster.

All to say, we did this, and fine, love to take over Walgreens with three crazy kids, but if you want uptake to be higher you have to make it easier.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I've admittedly skipped the prior pages, so maybe someone has already made this post, and I'm 100% all in for vaccinations.

But we need to get to a point where covid vaccines are cyclical and routine like flu shots. This year the flu shot was released earlier, and the new covid booster was hard to come by. Our pediatrician offered many many flu clinics, but since they didn't have the new covid shot, it wasn't available. And for adults that are used to getting the flu shot in October, it required an extra appointment to get the new booster.

All to say, we did this, and fine, love to take over Walgreens with three crazy kids, but if you want uptake to be higher you have to make it easier.

I think in the coming years it will be a lot easier, there was just a big change because the government was paying for all Covid vaccines and then we switched to our messed up healthcare system where some people get private insurance to cover it, some people have government funded insurance, and those without insurance are eligible for free vaccines this year. but because the system is all parsed out it’s harder to navigate.

A huge reason the government is recommending everyone get it is so insure will have to pay for it. If they only make her recommendation that older people and say babies have to get it, like used to be the case with flu shot recommendations, insurer are not required to cover those vaccines. They wanted to make it widely available for people who would like to get the shot.

I agree that not everyone needs to get the shot if they don’t want it but I do think it should be available for healthy middle-age folks who just want the shot and insurance should cover it just like flu.

In other countries, it’s all run through the government, so that is why they didn’t give a blanket recommendation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I've admittedly skipped the prior pages, so maybe someone has already made this post, and I'm 100% all in for vaccinations.

But we need to get to a point where covid vaccines are cyclical and routine like flu shots. This year the flu shot was released earlier, and the new covid booster was hard to come by. Our pediatrician offered many many flu clinics, but since they didn't have the new covid shot, it wasn't available. And for adults that are used to getting the flu shot in October, it required an extra appointment to get the new booster.

All to say, we did this, and fine, love to take over Walgreens with three crazy kids, but if you want uptake to be higher you have to make it easier.

I think in the coming years it will be a lot easier, there was just a big change because the government was paying for all Covid vaccines and then we switched to our messed up healthcare system where some people get private insurance to cover it, some people have government funded insurance, and those without insurance are eligible for free vaccines this year. but because the system is all parsed out it’s harder to navigate.

A huge reason the government is recommending everyone get it is so insure will have to pay for it. If they only make her recommendation that older people and say babies have to get it, like used to be the case with flu shot recommendations, insurer are not required to cover those vaccines. They wanted to make it widely available for people who would like to get the shot.

I agree that not everyone needs to get the shot if they don’t want it but I do think it should be available for healthy middle-age folks who just want the shot and insurance should cover it just like flu.

In other countries, it’s all run through the government, so that is why they didn’t give a blanket recommendation.

The CDC should make covid vaccine recommendations based on medical merit, not for the purpose of gaming insurance companies. The CDC's Advisory Cmte on Immunization Practices (ACIP) is composed of medical experts precisely so that they can assess and make vaccine recommendations from a medical perspective, not to figure out health care financing issues. The latter should be dealt with by policy/legislative officials. This is why people have lost confidence in CDC/official covid messaging.

You suggest that the CDC's broad recommendation is helpful to people without medical necessity so that they can get the covid shot free of charge. However, there are real negative consequences of this broad recommendation. Seventy colleges still mandate covid vaccines for young people who face almost no risk from covid but who are at the highest risk of vaccine side effects. The CDC's broad recommendation provides cover for these colleges to continue their mandates. Absent the CDC's broad recommendation, it would be hard for them to keep mandates in place. (Particularly troubling is that some of these colleges only mandate covid vaccines for low-risk students but not for higher-risk faculty or staff.) Every vaccine has side effects, the covid vaccine more than most; they should only be recommended for those individuals where the medical benefit exceeds the medical risks.

The CDC should make vaccine recommendations based on medical merit and let others figure out financing issues. And they should not be asking PCPs to make broad covid vaccination recommendations that are motivated by optimizing insurance funding rather than individual health needs. Nearly every other nation in the world has concluded that covid vaccines should only be recommended for the vulnerable. The CDC should follow suit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I've admittedly skipped the prior pages, so maybe someone has already made this post, and I'm 100% all in for vaccinations.

But we need to get to a point where covid vaccines are cyclical and routine like flu shots. This year the flu shot was released earlier, and the new covid booster was hard to come by. Our pediatrician offered many many flu clinics, but since they didn't have the new covid shot, it wasn't available. And for adults that are used to getting the flu shot in October, it required an extra appointment to get the new booster.

All to say, we did this, and fine, love to take over Walgreens with three crazy kids, but if you want uptake to be higher you have to make it easier.

I think in the coming years it will be a lot easier, there was just a big change because the government was paying for all Covid vaccines and then we switched to our messed up healthcare system where some people get private insurance to cover it, some people have government funded insurance, and those without insurance are eligible for free vaccines this year. but because the system is all parsed out it’s harder to navigate.

A huge reason the government is recommending everyone get it is so insure will have to pay for it. If they only make her recommendation that older people and say babies have to get it, like used to be the case with flu shot recommendations, insurer are not required to cover those vaccines. They wanted to make it widely available for people who would like to get the shot.

I agree that not everyone needs to get the shot if they don’t want it but I do think it should be available for healthy middle-age folks who just want the shot and insurance should cover it just like flu.

In other countries, it’s all run through the government, so that is why they didn’t give a blanket recommendation.

The CDC should make covid vaccine recommendations based on medical merit, not for the purpose of gaming insurance companies. The CDC's Advisory Cmte on Immunization Practices (ACIP) is composed of medical experts precisely so that they can assess and make vaccine recommendations from a medical perspective, not to figure out health care financing issues. The latter should be dealt with by policy/legislative officials. This is why people have lost confidence in CDC/official covid messaging.

You suggest that the CDC's broad recommendation is helpful to people without medical necessity so that they can get the covid shot free of charge. However, there are real negative consequences of this broad recommendation. Seventy colleges still mandate covid vaccines for young people who face almost no risk from covid but who are at the highest risk of vaccine side effects. The CDC's broad recommendation provides cover for these colleges to continue their mandates. Absent the CDC's broad recommendation, it would be hard for them to keep mandates in place. (Particularly troubling is that some of these colleges only mandate covid vaccines for low-risk students but not for higher-risk faculty or staff.) Every vaccine has side effects, the covid vaccine more than most; they should only be recommended for those individuals where the medical benefit exceeds the medical risks.

The CDC should make vaccine recommendations based on medical merit and let others figure out financing issues. And they should not be asking PCPs to make broad covid vaccination recommendations that are motivated by optimizing insurance funding rather than individual health needs. Nearly every other nation in the world has concluded that covid vaccines should only be recommended for the vulnerable. The CDC should follow suit.

*THIS

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Only ~14% Of U.S. Adults Have Gotten Latest Covid-19 Vaccine Update
What are we in for???

https://www.forbes.com/sites/brucelee/2023/11/18/only-14-of-us-adults-have-gotten-latest-updated-covid-19-vaccine/

Terrifying stat. What are people thinking?

[Anonymous]

These are the states with the highest rates of new COVID-19 hospital admissions as of today:
West Virginia (15.79)
Indiana (11.91)
South Dakota (11.64)
Missouri (11.45)
Wyoming (11.06)
Iowa (10.93)
Nebraska (10.75)
Kentucky (10.72)
Montana (10.67)

Midwest is getting hit hard. This is a major travel 3 day weekend.
source: https://www.usnews.com/news/health-news/articles/these-are-the-top-covid-hot-spots-in-the-u-s

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:These are the states with the highest rates of new COVID-19 hospital admissions as of today:
West Virginia (15.79)
Indiana (11.91)
South Dakota (11.64)
Missouri (11.45)
Wyoming (11.06)
Iowa (10.93)
Nebraska (10.75)
Kentucky (10.72)
Montana (10.67)

Midwest is getting hit hard. This is a major travel 3 day weekend.
source: https://www.usnews.com/news/health-news/articles/these-are-the-top-covid-hot-spots-in-the-u-s

Are these patients hospitalized solely due to covid, or is covid secondary to their main reason for hospitalization?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:These are the states with the highest rates of new COVID-19 hospital admissions as of today:
West Virginia (15.79)
Indiana (11.91)
South Dakota (11.64)
Missouri (11.45)
Wyoming (11.06)
Iowa (10.93)
Nebraska (10.75)
Kentucky (10.72)
Montana (10.67)

Midwest is getting hit hard. This is a major travel 3 day weekend.
source: https://www.usnews.com/news/health-news/articles/these-are-the-top-covid-hot-spots-in-the-u-s

The rates you quote are per 100,000 people. So, WV has 16 covid positive hospital admissions per 100,000 people. From this report, 41 states have covid hospital admissions that are deemed to be "low" by the CDC rating and no state has a "high" level of admissions.

Also, as another PP said, the majority of these hospital admissions are likely not due to covid itself, but rather are cases where covid was a contributory factor or cases where patients were found to be incidentally covid positive after being admitted to the hospital for other reasons.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:These are the states with the highest rates of new COVID-19 hospital admissions as of today:
West Virginia (15.79)
Indiana (11.91)
South Dakota (11.64)
Missouri (11.45)
Wyoming (11.06)
Iowa (10.93)
Nebraska (10.75)
Kentucky (10.72)
Montana (10.67)

Midwest is getting hit hard. This is a major travel 3 day weekend.
source: https://www.usnews.com/news/health-news/articles/these-are-the-top-covid-hot-spots-in-the-u-s

Covid cases and hospital admissions always rise in the winter. Therefore, it is not useful to look at weekly changes or isolated snapshots. It is best to make year-over-year comparisons to strip out seasonal effects. Currently, US weekly covid hospitalizations are down 30% relative to this time last year and are lower still relative to 2021 and 2020. So we are in a much better place this year even with minimal uptake of the booster. Omicron continues to be a mild variant. https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#trends_weeklyhospitaladmissions_select_00

[Anonymous]

Sadly, an old friend down south was sick but of course went ahead and attended her extended family get together earlier in Dec. Now her elderly dad is in the hospital, and most of her family is sick as well, preparing to give it to their coworkers.

It's hard to believe adults can't be responsible and stay home if they are sick, or at least wear a decent mask.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sadly, an old friend down south was sick but of course went ahead and attended her extended family get together earlier in Dec. Now her elderly dad is in the hospital, and most of her family is sick as well, preparing to give it to their coworkers.

It's hard to believe adults can't be responsible and stay home if they are sick, or at least wear a decent mask.

My parent had the booster and a few weeks after getting it, got covid and a few weeks after that died. Someone at the assisted living that they ate with had it and spread it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These are the states with the highest rates of new COVID-19 hospital admissions as of today:
West Virginia (15.79)
Indiana (11.91)
South Dakota (11.64)
Missouri (11.45)
Wyoming (11.06)
Iowa (10.93)
Nebraska (10.75)
Kentucky (10.72)
Montana (10.67)

Midwest is getting hit hard. This is a major travel 3 day weekend.
source: https://www.usnews.com/news/health-news/articles/these-are-the-top-covid-hot-spots-in-the-u-s

Covid cases and hospital admissions always rise in the winter. Therefore, it is not useful to look at weekly changes or isolated snapshots. It is best to make year-over-year comparisons to strip out seasonal effects. Currently, US weekly covid hospitalizations are down 30% relative to this time last year and are lower still relative to 2021 and 2020. So we are in a much better place this year even with minimal uptake of the booster. Omicron continues to be a mild variant. https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#trends_weeklyhospitaladmissions_select_00

Thank goodness

[Anonymous]

There’s a lot of traveling airplane rides, etc. this weekend creating lots of cross pollination of viruses so everyone please vaccinate and mask up. Be safe.