QUESTION: Wouldnt any CV19 vaccine have to be 98% effective vs 50% effective like some Flu vaccines?

[Aristus]

29. I have a rational skepticism of anyone claiming not to be an anti-vaxxer, but using language like

"A vaccine would kill lots of people."

Vaccines don't kill people. In the past, sure, it happened. But the people who needed to learn from that, learned from that.

If a vaccine is ineffective, one can die from the COVID-19 the vaccine was intended to shield the patient from. But it's not the vaccine that would do the killing.

And the "Only 50% effective" trope is common among anti-vaxxers. While no vaccine is 100% effective, the goal is to reduce morbidity and mortality from infectious disease. The CDC creates a model for a yearly influenza vaccine based on the best available scientific data, to predict which strain of influenza will be the dominant strain in any given flu season. The prediction is not always accurate, and the resulting vaccine may sometimes have only a 25% effectiveness rate.

However, as anyone with medical training and clinical experience can tell you, even a 25% effectiveness rate can be the difference between life and death, since a partial immunity is vastly preferable to no immunity at all.

Arbitrarily assigning a predicted effectiveness rate of 98% is unrealistic, and can alter people's perceptions of the importance of vaccines. It falls along the lines of "making perfect the enemy of the good." If a vaccine is proven to be safe and effective in combating the spread of viral infection, that's the prize. Let's keep our eyes on that, and not on some brainstormed 98% effectiveness expectation.