The vaccine against covid-19: a smart decision?
The vaccine against covid-19: a smart decision?
The vaccine against covid-19 is already a reality, and the planet is turning against the clock in vaccination plans.
More than 73 million people worldwide have been infected with covid-19, a figure that exceeds the number of inhabitants of France, the United Kingdom and Thailand. 1.6 million have died from this disease; over 300,000 in the United States.
The pandemic continues its perennial expansion while medical science, in unprecedented research and development work, works against the clock in its attempt to contain it and record it, once and for all, as yet another dark episode in the history of humanity.
On December 11, 2020, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued an emergency use authorization for the vaccine. The one produced by Pfizer and BioNTech was chosen, with 95% efficacy in fighting the virus with two doses.
The risks of not getting vaccinated
“The implications of not getting vaccinated are relatively simple: you can get very severe covid-19 and you can die. I think it is very important that people understand that one should be vaccinated. You need to have that vaccine,” said Dr. Joseph Varón, chief of staff at the United Memorial Medical Center in Houston, in an interview with CNN en Español.
Although some versions have emerged, without sufficient scientific support, that highlight the preference for an immune response through natural infection, experts agree that mass vaccination would be the safest way to stop the pandemic.
The unpredictable immune response of natural infection can vary depending on the amount of virus a person is exposed to. On the other hand, with a vaccine, an equal dose is guaranteed for everyone. “We know the dose that is being administered, and we know that dose is effective in eliciting an immune response,” Jennifer Gommerman, an immunologist at the University of Toronto, said in a New York Times” article.
Resisting the vaccine would mean continuing in a situation very similar to the one we are experiencing now, contributing to the permanence of the virus for several more years and, therefore, with its fatal consequences.
“If the disease starts to progress, the people who are vaccinated will come out ahead. People who are not vaccinated will have the infection and the worst thing is that they can infect others. So, from a public health point of view, you become a problem,” Varon explained on CNN en Español.
Both medical research and the development of vaccines and treatments are advances that have allowed humanity to overcome health crises more serious than the current one. Therefore, misinformation in this regard can materialize in a greater number of affected and dead.
Although the covid-19 vaccine from Pfizer and BioNTech is excellent news for the world, experts insist that self-care remains an effective tool to combat covid-19 by our own means .
