Hmm did he mean that it doesn’t affect transmission (as in reduce R0) or that it literally can’t prevent transmission (R0 reduced, but still >>0)?

The latter is trivially true. I’m guessing he said it anyway because it was intended for a different audience.

I don’t think they literally reduce illness and death to zero, but just pretty close. I would assume they were using the same definition of “prevent” in both places in that sentence.

Preventing transmission != reducing transmission rates.

The vaccines absolutely do the later.

This seems to be so hard for some to understand that it smacks of dis-ingenuity.

are you sure about that? - seems right now the most vaccinated states also seem to have the largest spike in cases - I agree the vaccine, at this point anyway, seems to be reducing deaths - but not sure I agree on transmission - seems like it it still spreading worse than before.

And no, I am not an antivaxxer i I am triple vaxxed myself and work in the healthcare field.

The only real overlap right now is new england, places like the PNW have high vaccinations and low case rates. Regardless, there are so many factors that affect transmission, you can't easily learn much from geographic comparisons due to the impossibility of eliminating the confounds.

However the science is clear, all else being equal, covid vaccines reduce transmission rates.