Dear University of Oregon community members,
It is our fervent belief that it is only through vaccinations that our nation and our university will find a way out of the pandemic. Although vaccines may not eliminate COVID-19 entirely from our campus, if we can achieve a high enough rate of vaccination among our students, staff, and faculty, we can better protect the health and well being of the members of our community and ultimately drive down the transmission rate of the disease. It is for that reason that on May 10, we announced a vaccination requirement for the University of Oregon.
Under state and federal law we were required to make it possible for people to claim an exemption based upon three criteria. Most people on campus have until September to let us know their vaccination status, but the early signs are very, very promising. Based upon folks who have reported to us thus far, the vast majority of our community is coming together to protect each other.
The first vaccine deadline was last Friday, August 13, for the School of Law’s faculty and staff. We are thrilled to report that of the 93.6 percent of the law school community who met the deadline for reporting, 97.6 percent report that they have been vaccinated.
With respect to the entire campus, thus far 52 percent of our students have reported their vaccination status. Of these students who have reported, 96.4 percent have been vaccinated. Similarly, 69 percent of our faculty and staff have told us whether they have been vaccinated. Over 96 percent have answered in the affirmative.
There is no guarantee that this extraordinarily high level of vaccination will persist as the remaining members of the UO community report their status. But we are very happy with the early results.
We know that these figures are of great interest to many of you. Our decision making throughout the pandemic has been driven by the science, and understanding community vaccination rates is a critical component of this. From the beginning of the COVID-19 nightmare we did everything we could to be as transparent as possible and we are committed to that principle going forward. Therefore, we created a dashboard tracking our vaccination rates across campus. The dashboard will be updated every week.
We would like to close by thanking everyone for your commitment to protecting not just yourselves, but for protecting our entire community. Toward that end, please encourage your friends and your co-workers to get vaccinated.
Sincerely,
Michael H. Schill
President and Professor of Law
Patrick C. Phillips
Provost and Senior Vice President
yes I filled out the form
I was not even offered a chance at an exceptional lottery raffle and
of course, even though I have digital image of my vaxx card –
I was not asked to submit it – so another form without any
verification. Let’s just run this university on a statistical basis,
wait, that’s already what we do – all of us are only items on
a spreadsheet.
ye of little faith! I hope they continue successfully to encourage everyone to get vaxxed and fill out the forms.
But the stats at their covid dashboard don’t look so great. Rapid exponential-like growth of cases among both students and staff.
Hard not to wonder what the real plan is for Fall. My guess is they bring in the students and their bucks, then go to remote, or part remote. I know too many faculty, especially over 50’s (which is a lot) who will balk at teaching in-class. The vaccine is proving too fickle with the delta variant, especially given its horrifying transmissibility. The booster will come too late, and besides, no reason to expect it to solve the problem very well. I’m afraid we are in a pickle (to put it politely).
Honestly among the students, it’s not wrong to let Delta booster their vaccines vs. a 3rd booster.
The herd immunity equation is clear
(1-1/Ro)/E, with R0 of 6, and efficacy of 0.7 (for infection way higher for severe disease), the vaccination threshold is 121 percent.
Which can’t ever happen, so the disease will end up endemic, but fade in health and policy importance as people gain immunity through repeated exposure and those who aren’t vaccinated but are vulnerable tragically die before they had to.
Get vaccinated, because Delta will confirm for you, regardless of your politics, beliefs, or what mask you wear. Sooner or later, you’ll likely be infected with it.
dude, are you saying let the virus rip among the students? Are you saying herd immunity is possible if only the students get infected (say in “covid parties”) rather than have a third shot? Yike! I don’t believe it. I don’t believe that getting covid has better “efficacy” in preventing spread, if that’s what you’re saying. (I grant what you say about the herd immunity equation.)
And I doubt that the staff wants an explosion of infected, transmissible students in their classes and offices!
By all means, everybody who can should get vaccinated, a third time if that’s what it takes. But to repeat, not clear that anything is really the answer any more — your point about herd immunity being impossible now is part of the story.
Maybe if the damn virus mutates to something much less deadly, like the coronaviruses that cause (a minority of) common colds. But it seems like that will take a long time, if it happens at all.
I’m saying exposure to a virus after you’ve been vaccinated increases your subsequent immunity. This has generally always been true. Now they are finding more and more evidence of side effects and heart inflammation particularly in younger men aged 15-40. It’s entirely possible that a 3rd dose will prove no safer than exposure to the virus in the wild for younger populations.
But read what the immunologists are really saying now. Endemic virus. Based upon a more transmissible virus with a vaccine that has limited efficacy at preventing infection (even though it’s very effective at preventing infection, and honest true Uncle Bernie, the honest truth is the numbers suggest herd immunity will never come no matter how many we vaccinate.
So I’m not saying don’t get vaccinated. If anything, the opposite. But I’m saying vaccinated or not, we will likely all end up infected. Of course if the vaccines end up more effective at preventing transmission, it might still fade away, after 90 percent of the pop is vaccinated or exposed.
The US military disagrees with your risk assessment and your epidemiological analysis is more than a little dubious. I’ll stick with expert opinion on this matter and I hope UO does too.
Article please?
Do they have different spread rates or different efficacy rates?
Can anyone explain why they aren’t verifying claims of vaccination?
its logistically difficult? how to verify? is you vaxx record in a digital database that you can access? only proof is your easily lost
vaxx card and that can be faked easily as well.
OHA just dropped a report on breakthrough cases here.
tl;dr The rate of covid in unvaxxed is six times the rate in vaxxed. The report doesn’t say this, but since unvaxxed skew younger and healthier than vaxxed, it’s reasonable to conclude that the vaccine is still ~90% effective.
What’s the collective take by United Academics in reaction to the amazing reopening Plan, which currently is a mystery, except everyone just show up and fill classrooms to full capacity? Delta is all about physical proximity and duration of exposure. UA will hopefully be proactive with this health crisis disaster with their own plan to protect their members. Good luck and stay safe.
And what about us part-time caretakers of little folks too young to vaccinate? We just walk into class and let all the incubators have at us? Then we go home and play with the little ones and hope for the best?
Another win for Lane Co announced in the last hour: 240 new cases. Besting every other county. We’ve been winning every day all week. Feeling that civic pride and armored with trust in our leadership we go forward with glad faces onto campus.
The only silver lining is the steeper Delta has peaked, the more dramatic its fall has generally been in other regions.
I’m not an epidemiologist, so I feel a little silly arguing about this, but my objections are that
(1) (1−1/R₀)E is a very crude approximation of the herd immunity threshold.
(2) R₀ isn’t well-defined because it depends on numerous other factors like individual behavior and the connectivity of social networks.
(3) E should be how effective the vaccine is at preventing transmission, not how effective it is at preventing infection, and it looks to me like 0.7 is too low for either (but we don’t really know yet). Plus E also isn’t well-defined across the entire population.
As a counterexample, measles has been eliminated in the US (according to the WHO) even though (1−1/R₀)/E ≈ 1 > 0.91, the current vax rate. The outbreaks that do occur are introduced from abroad and are invariably in very low-vax communities. It’s all about good vax coverage and people listening to public health officials.
https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/52/7/911/299077
is a good summary of the way that herd immunity is theoretically approached and various complications and limitations.
Herd immunity is most likely better specified by a non-linear asymptotic approach, but in the real world that distinction may not matter.
The meaning of E is ambiguous and open to interpretation.