Difference between revisions of "Talk:2557: Immunity"

Explain xkcd: It's 'cause you're dumb.
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:But the mutations come about from the virus replicating a lot, i.e in people with the virus. It still doesn't make sense to catch it, because you have a chance of your infection being the one that produces a terrible mutation [[Special:Contributions/141.101.77.130|141.101.77.130]] 22:02, 20 December 2021 (UTC)
 
:But the mutations come about from the virus replicating a lot, i.e in people with the virus. It still doesn't make sense to catch it, because you have a chance of your infection being the one that produces a terrible mutation [[Special:Contributions/141.101.77.130|141.101.77.130]] 22:02, 20 December 2021 (UTC)
 
::That isn't how mutations work.  Mutations are able to propagate strongly only in environments where there is something killing off the parent species, and where the mutation provides better survivability.  Like a functioning immune system attacking the parent virus, but a mutation allows something to slip by.  Thus, people with the partial immunity provided by either vaccines or infection, are the ones more likely to create a mutation than new patients with no inherent immunity, or people with natural immunity from previous bouts with related diseases.[[User:Seebert|Seebert]] ([[User talk:Seebert|talk]]) 14:11, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
 
::That isn't how mutations work.  Mutations are able to propagate strongly only in environments where there is something killing off the parent species, and where the mutation provides better survivability.  Like a functioning immune system attacking the parent virus, but a mutation allows something to slip by.  Thus, people with the partial immunity provided by either vaccines or infection, are the ones more likely to create a mutation than new patients with no inherent immunity, or people with natural immunity from previous bouts with related diseases.[[User:Seebert|Seebert]] ([[User talk:Seebert|talk]]) 14:11, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
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:::Even immune system without vaccine or prior infection is killing Covid a lot, providing plenty of opportunities for more effective mutation. And infection typically last LONGER if patient is not vaccinated, providing more TIME for virus to mutate. So, mutation can occur in both vaccinated or unvaccinated, with hard to compare probabilities. It's true that mutation from someone vaccinated has higher CHANCE to be vaccine-resistant, but on the other hand, seems omikron is from unvaccinated population ... -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 23:32, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
  
 
I can see this one annoying a lot of people. It's the lot of people who can already be annoying, so I don't think that's a big problem. (A few, who misread it as about ''vaccination'' giving immunity, may actually think it supports them. I'm not sure we can do anything about that either.) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.159.85|162.158.159.85]] 21:51, 20 December 2021 (UTC)
 
I can see this one annoying a lot of people. It's the lot of people who can already be annoying, so I don't think that's a big problem. (A few, who misread it as about ''vaccination'' giving immunity, may actually think it supports them. I'm not sure we can do anything about that either.) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.159.85|162.158.159.85]] 21:51, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

Revision as of 23:32, 21 December 2021


well, if you look at society as a whole it makes more sense. the reason we have so many mutations is that we have a significant portion of the populous with no immunity 172.68.110.125 20:49, 20 December 2021 (UTC) mark ifi

But the mutations come about from the virus replicating a lot, i.e in people with the virus. It still doesn't make sense to catch it, because you have a chance of your infection being the one that produces a terrible mutation 141.101.77.130 22:02, 20 December 2021 (UTC)
That isn't how mutations work. Mutations are able to propagate strongly only in environments where there is something killing off the parent species, and where the mutation provides better survivability. Like a functioning immune system attacking the parent virus, but a mutation allows something to slip by. Thus, people with the partial immunity provided by either vaccines or infection, are the ones more likely to create a mutation than new patients with no inherent immunity, or people with natural immunity from previous bouts with related diseases.Seebert (talk) 14:11, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
Even immune system without vaccine or prior infection is killing Covid a lot, providing plenty of opportunities for more effective mutation. And infection typically last LONGER if patient is not vaccinated, providing more TIME for virus to mutate. So, mutation can occur in both vaccinated or unvaccinated, with hard to compare probabilities. It's true that mutation from someone vaccinated has higher CHANCE to be vaccine-resistant, but on the other hand, seems omikron is from unvaccinated population ... -- Hkmaly (talk) 23:32, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

I can see this one annoying a lot of people. It's the lot of people who can already be annoying, so I don't think that's a big problem. (A few, who misread it as about vaccination giving immunity, may actually think it supports them. I'm not sure we can do anything about that either.) 162.158.159.85 21:51, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

Would you kindly provide a link to the "Mount Stupid" comic for reference. -- 172.70.174.119 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

To be fair, if the vaccination would only protect you for ONE infection it wouldn't be worth it. The idea about immunity is that immunity trained by either vaccination or infection will then protect you from multiple following infections. The problem with it is that in case of covid (or flu), the immunity wanes off with time AND the virus mutates into new variants the immunity doesn't work as well against. Sure, it still makes sense to vaccinate, but just because the virus spread so much you are very likely to catch it. -- Hkmaly (talk) 22:32, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

Are you making the mistake (without the other baggage) I mentioned above about misreading the comic? This comic isn't about the vaccination at all. It's about infection. 172.70.86.22 22:51, 20 December 2021 (UTC)
Infection is the normal method of vaccination. Until recently with mRNA vaccines, almost all vaccines were about infection- either with the disease itself, a weakened version of the disease, or a related disease.Seebert (talk) 14:11, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
(And, to add, if the vaccine just protected against ONE infection, where that one infection was sufficiently dangerous, it would indeed be worth it. Better than chancing the infection on a naïve immune system and hoping to come out the other side with a similarly infection-specific immune effect (c.f. annual flu waves) but without the QC and care given to the vector.) ((See, I knew it'd spark response, didn't intend to say much. Maybe I should just stay out of this until it blows over.)) 172.70.85.79 23:01, 20 December 2021 (UTC)
Of course it is about the vaccination - this supports Randall's earlier statements for being pro vaccine, that you should get the immunity from vaccination and not from infection! --Kynde (talk) 08:24, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
Hmmm, no. It's about COVID (and that by inference). It doesn't mention the vaccine. The conversation might have been about the vaccine, but the comic (and its discussion of what it is sensible to do, or not) is vaccine free. It's "anti-infection", but not directly "pro-vaccine". (He, I and you are all sensibly pro-vaccine, I think. The comic itself is only vocal on that subject by omission and a chain of logic that will never occur to those stuck at the original fallacy.) 172.70.85.73 13:06, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

People who know a lot about the immune system could also be referring to people who are aware of possibilities like the varicella zoster virus which causes chickenpox, but stays dormant in your body after you recover and can come back later as shingles. This is less likely to happen if you get the vaccine to prevent chickenpox in the first place. --Norgaladir (talk) 00:32, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

A vaccination doesn't necessarily give you immunity, e.g. with the Covid or influenca vaccines, so you still can get infected. But being vaccinated reduces the risk of suffering complications like death that can ruin your and other peoples' life.162.158.94.229 07:59, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

...significantly reduces the risk, in fact. It likely also (though it's a harder thing to establish) reduces the catch-and-transmit rate, thus yet another thing to do to help others, even those you'll never meet directly, who are unable or (ugh!) unwilling to think this far ahead. Unmitigated (and, especially, sought-after) 'natural' infection as represented in the comic just helps spread the thing further and faster and does a gross disservice to onward contacts, contacts-of-contacts, etc, etc. Excuse my preaching to the choir here, but it needs to be said. 172.70.85.73 13:06, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
You're not preaching to the choir exclusively, plenty of lurkers (like me) are reading along. 108.162.241.143 17:01, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

While trying to update the explanation for 'neutrality of tone' and address some infectious disease history, I came across this Infectious Diseases in Critical Care article from the NIH published January 3 of 2020 which includes a comparison of smallpox, measles, SARS-1, and MERS-cov illustrating how significantly vaccination has reduced global infections. Check out the graph of measles from 1980. 172.70.110.227 13:46, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

My hero is the person who added the citation needed to "Diseases are bad", as well as those who realize that vaccination is largely a form of infection on purpose (within one of the following five options: infection by the disease itself, infection by a weakened disease, infection by a killed and inactive version of the disease, infection by a related less dangerous disease that shares some characteristics with the original disease, infection by a laboratory created RNA strands that mimic the disease being attacked). Therefore, catching the disease on purpose, is a form of vaccination. Israel did a study on infection by the disease itself and found 6.7 times stronger immune response than other forms of COVID-19 vaccination. [1] Seebert (talk) 14:11, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

This should indicate that a better (at preparing your immune system to resist future infection) vaccine (process) may be possible. Without saying that current vaccines are ineffective. 108.162.241.97 17:06, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
I like how you make sure to use the "laboratory created" modifier for the RNA vaccine, but not the other types. As if they all grew on trees or something. Here's a hint: all vaccines were created in a lab, though many were created more directly by modifying an existing virus, in that lab. PotatoGod (talk) 21:15, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

I would like to add that the comic criticizes only a part of anti-vaxxers population that show the circular logic presented. There are other parts, e.g. those who are not quite sure if the cost/benefit (or rather risk/risk) calculus is right for the rapidly developed and hastily officially approved (in comparison to long-established vaccines against other diseases) and/or novel (mRNA) vaccine products, fearing long-time side effects of the vaccine. On the other hand, long-term effects of the disease itself are also not known yet, even if some middle-term ones are known or being investigated already. There are still other parts like those who oppose governmental obligations or pressure to vaccinate against covid and related restrictions, and take the refusal as a personal freedom stance. There may be others. -- 198.41.242.219 15:09, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

This very much feels like a straw man. I get that it's a webcomic, but can we talk about this? The description says that natural immunity is "short lived" (as in, how short-lived, and how much compared to vaccination?) but meanwhile I hear like one in five COVID hospitalizations were vaccinated patients. Are there studies on reinfection with COVID in vaccinated vs non-vaccinated patients? It seems to me from the latest comics that Randall is frustrated. I think everyone is frustrated. Citation needed, haha. But I get tired of reading "haha the other side is dumb" from both sides of every damn issue these days, and the bigger the impact an issue has, the more furious the mudslinging. One could, for example, make the same "circular argument" jab at trusting the FDA in this example, or in a more agnostic case, the value of a college degree or a certification: Ex. "we're qualified to make decisions about what's right or smart for the populace because we're a bunch of people who say so, and we have a pretty looking seal to prove it, and also please keep giving us a lot of money." I mean, for those of us who have been to college, haven't we all churned our way through that just to get into the workforce and discover that it's completely different than what we actually needed to know? Would we call people "anti-uni's" and laugh at their incompetence for questioning the system? Even at the unlikely minimum of "anti-vaxxers (or x-person who disagrees with me) are 100% dumb and wrong and that's a fact", isn't the discourse important? I understand that the opposite extreme is "I'd rather let my child die of Polio than trust another human being", but isn't that just another straw man? When are we going to stop polarizing? Thoughts?108.162.237.147 16:28, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

It might be Randall is (intentionally or accidentally) touching on your point by making this comic's thesis ambiguous. People who aren't thinking deeply about the topic on both sides will initially think it confirms their worldview, until they see more discussion on the matter. So the comic's ambiguity might prompt more discussion by and between both sides. 108.162.241.143 17:18, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
Re: "I hear like one in five COVID hospitalizations were vaccinated patients." ....if less than one in five people are vaccinated, this is a problem. Either it means there is a problem with the vaccine (unlikely) or that the vaccinated are putting themselves more at risk thinking they are more 'virusproof' than they are. If more (and hopefully significantly more) than 20% of the populace are vaccinated then this is actually a positive sign for the whole issue - even if there's still social hubris underestimating the precautions they still may need to take.162.158.159.73 17:34, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
At least in the US, significantly more than 1 in 5 people are vaccinated. It's a little over 3 in 5 fully vaccinated. But I would suggest that even that isn't necessarily the statistic to look at - pretty sure covid is still more likely to be serious for older people and folks with preexisting conditions, all else being equal, and those populations have an even higher vaccination rate. 78% of folks 50-64 are fully vaccinated, and 84% 65+, per the CDC. So that makes the 1 in 5 represent *even less* risk.172.70.110.45 18:30, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

(Re: The "Why does my IP keep changing?" asked as an Edit-comment (see page history)... Because your gateway/pathway between yourself and the site goes through a limited and shared set of possible IPv4s. There's no guarantee you'll get the same IP (or even obvious range!) between edits, nor that your current IP won't be used by someone else in a few minutes. It's just a technical thing that greases the wheels of the Internet, even if it has funny repurcussions for some things like this.) 162.158.159.73 17:34, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

"However, what Cueball (and by extension Randall) fail to note is that bad or not, there are plenty of instances where someone has already recovered, and therefore already in possession of natural immunity." - Isn't that what the comic is about? I'm confused as to why this is on the explanation page? --enchantedsleeper (talk) 19:45, 21 December 2021 (UTC)