Thread by @tomaspueyo

Here's one way to understand vaccines vs. variants, why they're still good even if there are breakthroughs, and why you should protect yourself even if vaccinated:

Think of the virus like an invading army, and vaccines like your defense army. Thread 🧵

If an enemy army is about to invade, how are you better off: with, or without a defense army?

Obviously, with a defense.
Does it mean you will always win?
No.

The enemy might have lots of soldiers (high viral load), or its soldiers might be seasoned by war (aggressive variants).

The stronger it is, the more likely it is to run over your defenses, ravage you, and kill you.

No vaccine is like no specialized army.

In most cases, you still have the standard defenses against invaders. But your defenses are not used to this new enemy. When attacked, maybe your defenses are strong enough. But maybe they aren't and you die.

The vaccine gives you a specialized defense army.

These are a bunch of soldiers that are trained specifically to fight against this new invader. The first shot will give you soldiers trained to fight the old variant (so less experienced enemies).

The 2nd shot will give you even more of the same soldiers.

That's why it's useful to mix-and-match shots: by sending different training enemies to your defenses, they will learn not to just fight the young, inexperienced enemies from the 1st wave, but a more generic enemy.

A booster will give you even more defense soldiers.

Ideally, you have a booster that is specialized against the more battle-hardened delta soldiers. That will give you defense soldiers specialized against them.

Does it mean with 2 or 3 shots you will always win? Not necessarily.

You might not be able to recruit soldiers at all (eg, you are immunocompromised).

Those you recruit might be weak (eg, you are old / have pre-existing conditions).

You might get a massive invading army (huge viral load of a very aggressive variant) that overwhelms your defense.

But are you better off with a specialized army? Absolutely.

Also, remember this is not win or lose.
What if the forces are pretty equal and the enemy passes your walls? You start fighting in the city, destroying it in the process. Even if you win in the end, the collateral damage is high. That's like a hospitalization.

And that's why, even if vaccinated, you should be careful if you're indoors with lots of other people speaking/talking loudly. Someone can be very infectious without knowing it, send you a massive viral load, and overwhelm your defenses.

So mask up in these circumstances and, better, try to avoid them altogether, until so many people are vaccinated or have natural immunity, that the likelihood that anybody has a massive viral load to spread is super low.

Bottom line: your vaccines are your defense army against the invader army of the virus. The stronger your defense, and the weaker the attacker, the safer you are.