Below is the start of a report in The LA Times on Nov. 8, 2022 headlined "Are The Unvaxxed Still Dangerous."
in answering the question, the report provides some of the key statistics underlining the dangers of choosing to be unvaccinated.
in short, the unvaxxed face a much stronger chance of dying if they contract covid-19 than the vaxxed.
Normally, these sort of odds would spark some into action, but statistics has never been the forte of the unvaxxed.
LA TIMES:
"It’s been almost two years since the first COVID-19 vaccines first became available, and nearly one-third of Americans still haven’t completed their initial series of shots. One in 5 Americans haven’t rolled up their sleeves even once.
"This despite the fact that the shots are free, widely available and thoroughly tested, with more than 640 million doses administered in the U.S. alone.
"Most importantly, the vaccines have a proven track record of reducing the risk of dying of COVID-19.
"According to the most recent data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, people who were unvaccinated were six times more likely to die of COVID-19 compared with people who were fully vaccinated, and they were eight times more likely to die of the disease than people who were vaccinated and boosted.
"That alone sounds like a pretty good incentive to get poked with a few needles. But plenty of other inducements have been added to the mix — free doughnuts, Apple AirPods, college scholarships and a $1.5-million cash jackpot.
"Yet the ranks of the unvaccinated have barely budged, even after Novavax introduced a COVID-19 shot that uses the same tried-and-true technology as vaccines for tetanus, shingles and the flu.
"Vaccine mandates that might have forced some holdouts to get immunized are tied up in court and not being enforced.
"Is there any point in continuing to try to change people’s minds? Are the 100 million or so Americans who never made it to “fully vaccinated” status even a threat to those around them at this stage of the pandemic? Perhaps not.
“Clearly, the unvaccinated are a threat to themselves,” Dr. Jeffrey Shaman, an infectious disease specialist at Columbia University, told my colleague Melissa Healy. “The danger to the rest of us is a more debatable issue.”
