“Mr. Rauch, a senior fellow at the Brookings institution,

argues that human beings have a natural tendency to believe what they wish,

irrespective of evidence.” (From a book review in the October 13, 2021, Wall Street Journal)

Let’s look at some specific evidence related to our nasty battle over the virus vaccine. According to the Centers for Disease Control, as of October 4, 2021, 185,000,000 people in the U.S. have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19. By that October date, the CDC had received reports from 50 states and territories. The combined results showed that 30,177 of the 185 million vaccinated developed breakthrough infections complicated by hospitalization or death (6,617 of those 30-some thousand died).

According to my back-of-the envelope math, these numbers indicate that fewer than 4 people out of every 100,000 individuals who received Covid-19 vaccination have died of the disease. That seems to offer pretty good odds. The source of the above numbers, and more details, can be found here. (Ref)

So what particular group of our populace is the virus killing? According to data from mid-2021 and later, 98 to 99% of those dying recently from Covid-90 have been unvaccinated (see data here, and here).

These dying, unvaccinated individuals, as one might expect, include a good number of warring anti-vaxxers. Details are provided (here, and here).  These unfortunate deaths have caused grief and often considerable regret that the individual had not been vaccinated. This situation is reminiscent of  Ben Franklin’s regret that I described in a previous post. Vaccination wasn’t even a word in Franklin’s time, but a more primitive and less effective procedure known as inoculation was available for smallpox, a much more lethal disease than Covid-19. Inoculation (taking scabs of smallpox from one person and injecting the mashed particles into another) was much more dangerous than our vaccinations. It killed 2% or more of those so treated. Nevertheless, it provided better odds of living when compared with cases when the disease was contracted by personal contact. When thus acquired the malady killed roughly one-third of its victims. (It’s worth emphasizing that smallpox has been totally abolished by vaccination.) Nevertheless, given the conditions in Franklin’s time, one might understand why he, after assessing the risks, hesitated to inoculate his 4-year-old son against the disease. He came to bitterly regret his inaction when the lad died of that very illness.  (See it here).

All of these considerations shout loudly that getting vaccinated against Covid-19 is by far the best option. I’ve had all three Pfizer shots. Admittedly, some might argue that I acted simply on my wishes, as Mr. Rauch at the Brookings institution might suggest, but the evidence also is on my side.