The vaccines do NOT do the same thing. Molnupiravir directly modifies the RNA in the SARS-CoV-2 active in the patient's body. That vaccines can serve as a forcing function for viruses is not new information, but so does immunity from previous infections, and vaccination comes with the benefit of preventing a non-zero number of infections and transmissions relative to immunity from previous infection. Vaccines in general, including the COVID vaccines, remain the single best tool for disease prevention.
>preventing a non-zero number of infections and transmissions
You could argue it prevented transmissions, but given the vast majority of people everywhere have been infected, it's hard to argue the covid vaccines prevent infection, no? They only delay it.
Every exposure to COVID results in one of two possible outcomes: infection, or no infection. The COVID vaccines without a doubt increase the frequency of the second outcome and decrease the first, although their efficacy by this metric has been waning for over a year (they still seem superb at preventing serious illness and death). "Infections" doesn't mean "people who have ever been infected," which at this point is approaching 100% of the human population, it means "infections." The COVID vaccines prevent infections.
You think infection only happens once? People are racking up 3rd, 4th, 5th etc. infections now. Each one is another chance to create mutations. It will not stop until we stop transmission.
The more vaccinated/up to date boosted the population then the less chance for overall spread and transmission, leading to less mutations.
Continued nonstop spread of the virus because the population refuses to take vaccines, refuses to take boosters, refuses to keep up effective NPIs like masking, etc... that can all lead to more mutations.
Let's not spread misinformation; this kind of rhetoric is precisely why I'm forever skeptical of this whole ordeal.
Any factor that causes a population bottleneck effect will inevitably cause "mutations" as you call it, more appropriately described as evolution or to cause survivors and their descendants to subsequently replace the prior population.
Factors that cause a population bottleneck effect include vaccination, among many other things; the most infamous example in medical contexts is perhaps antibiotics.
"Mutations", more appropriately evolution, is fundamental to life on Earth as we know it and is inevitable. New covid variants that are resistant to prior vaccines and immune responses are an evolutionary response to the population bottleneck effects imposed by vaccines and our immune systems.
Actual mutations will happen with or without vaccines; errors and accidents in the transcribing of DNA are inevitable. Most such transcribing errors are benign and inconsequential, but some lead to significant differences (eg: cancers, resistance to certain chemicals, etc.).
In a strict sense, vaccine do not cause mutations. Vaccines will help strains that have mutated by removing competition, but that's very different from molnupiravir which actually induces mutations.
You are playing a bunch of semantic games to try and say "I wasn't TECHNICALLY wrong, as long as you redefine all of my words" but you're just serving up word salad.
So no, vaccines DO NOT CAUSE mutations. Mutations are a natural consequence of replication. Vaccines CAN cause FEWER mutations, as they reduce how much the virus can replicate inside you before your immune system clears it, reducing how many chances at mutation the population of covid viruses have.
The original comment that "vaccines do not cause mutations, period" was playing the same semantic game, by replying to a comment with a deliberate misinterpretation of its claims, which any reasonable reader would have understood to be referring to selection pressure from population bottlenecks, not the specific genomic process used by these drugs.
And actually, are the effects not basically the same? They both increase the likelihood of a new variant outcompeting existing variants, but in different ways - this drug increases the rate of mutations to new variants, whereas vaccination reduces the rate of mutations to existing variants. The effect in both cases is to favor new variants.
It's like how China banning Google and degrading service of US internet companies created an opportunity for domestic Chinese companies like Baidu to offer a lower-quality yet viable substitute to the firewalled service of its American counterpart, allowing them to grow their market-share to fund development toward feature parity with the original American apps.
This conversation gets confusing because "mutation" as a term is being used inappropriately (it's why I add scare quotes). I alluded to this already in my comment.
Actual mutations, as in DNA transcribing errors, will occur regardless of vaccines. It's an inevitable part of DNA replication. Such mutations can lead to evolution when faced with certain environmental factors such as a population bottleneck effect.
Vaccines, by way or increasing immune system response, can cause a population bottleneck effect and encourage evolution. We're seeing it with covid variants resistant to prior vaccines and immune responses.
The food system is sh*t. All these problems in healthcare are downstream of the real problems with the environment and food production pipeline. Preventative care is basically ignored and the problem will just get worse.
Sounds like you’re trying to spin it to make this seem like innocent moderation when it was internal employees and the government forcing their views via moderation rather than letting the discourse happen
Yea you are right - another idea would be to talk to your work and setup a satellite office with some co-workers closer to home...maybe working out of there part-time...you'd obviously have to make a case with the company but its doable
