We need better data on covid-19 and vaccination status
Farah Hancock of Radio NZ did this graph showing the number of new cases per 100,000 by vaccination status.
This data appears to show that unvaccinated people are having far fewer cases than vaccinated. Now this is not an argument not to be vaccinated as vaccinations reduce the risk of hospitalisation and death massively.
But we do need to understand how vaccination affects whether or not you can get Covid-19 and/or infect others, as this is at the heart of the rationale for vaccine mandates.
The data might be affected by lower testing rates by those unvaccinated. However if you get seriously sick, you’ll have to get tested. So how much of a factor this is, I don’t know.
The Government itself should be publishing clear data on vaccination status and infections, for new cases on a per capita basis. The only way you can get this data is to take a snapshot of their website every day and calculate the changes. This is not transparency.
Radio NZ has done an update and the latest data for new cases per 100,000 population is:
- Fully vaccinated 616/100,000
- Partially vaccinated 469/100,000
- Boosted 259/100,000
- Unvaccinated 244/100,000
On this data, I don’t see how you can make a case for vaccine mandates continuing – especially as the mandate is merely for full (double) vaccination, not to be boosted.
Vaccination definitely reduces your individual chance of being hospitalised or dying. But the NZ data does not indicate that unvaccinated people are more likely to get Covid, than vaccinated people – which is the rationale for the vaccine pass system.