(2022-03-31) ZviM They Don't Know About Second Booster

Zvi Mowshowitz: They Don’t Know About Second Booster. The FDA went ahead and did it, approving a fourth covid-19 vaccine shot for those age 50 or older. This is a reference post for those wondering if it makes sense to get that second booster.

The FDA approved the second booster by bypassing some of the normal procedures.

None of that means the standard drug process is necessarily bad or worthless. The process is very good at sniffing out any little potentially wrong thing or reason not to do something, and hence good at avoiding false positives. Which is sometimes what you want.

If your goal is to do a cost-benefit analysis to decide what to do, then turning things over to people who think costs and benefits do not belong in the same magisterium, and allowing them to act Deeply Concerned about things, does not seem like The Way.

Review: Should You Get a First Booster?

My answer to this continues to be yes.

Should You Get a Second Booster?

both decisions here are at worst small mistakes

My answer, for me, is no, I am not interested. The third shot was not too bad, but the next day was not especially fun, and I see little benefit. I do not intend to voluntarily get a fourth shot even if allowed and encouraged, unless we are facing:
A new wave.
From a new variant.
Where the old vaccine works.
But severity is higher.

That is also because I am young and healthy, so much so that I am not even currently eligible. If I was sufficiently old and/or unhealthy, I would have a lower threshold for boosting, but I would still wait until conditions were getting worse to better time the benefits.