If I have to choose between the AstraZeneca vaccine and getting infected, I'd rather get infected.
The symptoms experienced from receiving the vaccine are far milder than the symptoms experienced from contracting the virus. This is the whole point of vaccination.
I know of several cases of middle-aged people, without pathologies, who after taking this vaccine have been unable to get out of bed for several days. The normal thing in these young healthy people is that if they catch the virus, the symptoms are less than that.
Anecdotal evidence and hearsay is not representative of a general trend. In my part of the UK, people in the 40-49 age group have been receiving vaccinations during the last two weeks. A few people I've spoken to have had headaches and muscle aches for a day or so, but no-one I'm aware of has been confined to bed or even missed a day of work.
The coronavirus problem could have been solved in a better way: imposing restrictions only on the elderly and people with pathologies, instead of paralyzing entire economies. The problem is that no politician would dare to do that because then in the next election, the majority of millions of retirees would have voted against them because they felt discriminated against.
Agree that politicians could have performed much better. Quarantining of people entering the country back in Jan/Feb 2020, coupled with rigorous quarantining and contact tracing of anyone exhibiting symptoms would have been a good idea, and was obviously a good idea at the time, not merely with the benefit of hindsight. We could all see what was about to happen after watching it unfold in China and then spread out to countries such as Italy.