@lololulu19 said in Pfizer-BioNTech Still Immune From Lawsuits Over COVID-19 Vaccine After Federal Approval: Lawyers:
The vaccines are no longer effective... you heard it here first...
Why are there no NEW vaccines? They make new vaccines for the influenza flu every year.
Reasonable questions, and I certainly don't have ALL the answers... but let's start with the first assertion: The vaccines are no longer effective...
The COVID-19 vaccines are just as effective as ever... it's that their "lasting" influence on your immune system wanes over time. The "Booster" is supposed to kick your immune system hard enough to "make it stick" - and the booster is just another dose of the same vaccine.
Many of our vaccines are 3-dose vaccine.. the difference with COVID-19 is that the 1st 2 are so close together. It's my understanding that they're re-examining that protocol. (Remember: this is all NEW science with respect to COVID-19... we're still learning about this virus! That COVID-19 is another coronavirus doesn't really help much: we have vaccines against the flu, but not the cold - but both are caused by coronaviruses!)
As for the Flu analogy, if the same flu was infecting us each year, we wouldn't need new flu shots every year... but that's not the case. The flu that infects the world every year is different from year to year, and they cannot (yet) predict which one will be the "dominant" flu in any given year... thus, not only do you need a flu shot (of a different kind) each year, but there's a decent chance that it won't be effective against the flu that comes out THAT YEAR. (Edit: FWIW: I do NOT get the flu shot every year... I wait and see how BAD the flu "epidmic" is that year and the effectiveness of that year's shot and then make my decision. MOST years, I do NOT take the flu vaccine...)
Compare that to COVID-19 - which is (in spite of the variants) essentially the same virus world-wide, and there hasn't been a "new" one yet... just mutations, and thankfully the existing vaccines work on the mutations (so far) as well.
Finally, if (or perhaps when) COVID-19 mutates again (S. Africa is seeing a new strain that's potentially VERY dangerous), we may need NEW vaccines... let's keep our fingers crossed... that would add a whole new chapter to this ongoing, slow-rolling tragedy...