>> Was asked by a woman in her late 20s whether she should get the vaccine
>> as she was concerned about the risk of side effects (never mind she was overweight
>> and a smoker).
I wonder how many refusers actually make an effort to think about and compare risks. It's enough for me to 'know', based on reports, that the estimated risk of a nasty outcome from the vaccine seems to be in the 1 to 100,000-1,000,000 range. That's quite a bit less than the average annual risk of being a road fatality (around 1 in 20,000) and massively less than the average risk of death from a surgical procedure (around 1 in 100). The COVID-19 infection fatality rate for an unvaccinated 25-30 year old is probably in the 1 in 1000-10,000 range, itself very low but about 100 times worse than the vaccination risk.
Actually I suspect the problem is more one of trust, or lack of it. They know the risk is reported to be negligible, but they find it easier to believe they are being lied to, particularly about the possibility of unknown long-term risks.
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