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You’re ignoring that you getting vaccinated is not about you, but about protecting others. As long as the R value is above 1, every person vaccinated is protect

You’re ignoring that you getting vaccinated is not about you, but about protecting others. As long as the R value is above 1, every person vaccinated is protecting others more than themselves. Even at 90% effectiveness herd immunity is critical to stopping the pandemic. I fully support people’s right to opt out of social goods like the vaccine, but I’m afraid you should be refused access to many social services your presence would threaten: schools, transit, libraries, etc. We accept that we have to get a license to legally drive a car on public streets, why not accept a vaccine to access public spaces during a pandemic? Societies already compel a number of behaviors for unrestricted participation, I don’t see vaccines during a pandemic as being particularly onerous. > no longer have faith in my country I don’t know what country you live in, but many countries have the same assessment of many vaccines. Even if you distrust one country there are likely many more positive assessments you can turn to.

petertodd 6y ago
> You’re ignoring that you getting vaccinated is not about you, but about protecting others. No I'm not. I'm not at all worried about contracting covid. At my age and health, the science is very clear that COVID-19 poses almost no risk to me. The only reason I'd bother with a vaccine is to protect others. But protecting others doesn't just mean protecting others now. It also means protecting others in the future. Bad government is a _serious_ risk. > I don’t know what country you live in, but many countries have the same assessment of many vaccines. I wasn't talking about science in relation to vaccines. I was talking about science in relation to the entire policy. I do not believe my government (Canada) is making decisions based on science in its use of emergency powers in general. That's pretty clear by the fact that they're unable to justify so many of the decisions made with actual numbers and models. Emergency powers are dangerous tools. We hope they get reserved for situations where the benefit is worth the risk. But after seeing how badly, and unscientifically. government has handled the entire pandemic, I want to see those emergency powers further restricted, so they aren't so easy to use in the future. edit: Note how Trump has told the FDA chief that his options were to approve the Pfizer vaccine or resign: https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/12/11/trump-stephen-hahn-fda-covid-vaccine/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/12/11/trump-steph... What a terrible precedent for science.
- titanomachy 6y ago
  > I do not believe my government (Canada) is making decisions based on science As a Canadian currently living in the US, it seems to me like Canada has handled things better out of the two countries... less than half the deaths per capita, and they managed to avoid the hospital overloading that happened in some states. Putting a lid on international travel early on seemed to make a big difference for Canada, as well as having a nationwide quarantine requirement. I understand the sentiment though. When I visited Canada this year, the border agent read me sections of the Quarantine Act and I was pretty astonished at the extent of federal powers and penalties that had been created on such short notice. The maximum penalty for violating quarantine is a million dollar fine and three years in prison.
  - petertodd 6y ago
    > less than half the deaths per capita There's so much luck involved in those figures at any given point, not to mention the influence of different definitions and testing strategies, that I wouldn't make the claim that Canada is doing better or worse based on stats like that. Just look at the huge differences between different states (and in Canada's case, provinces). After all, two months ago you might have said that Sweden did much worse than the EU. Yet at this moment, the EU average reported deaths-per-capita is just slightly below Sweden's, with many countries significantly above.
    - titanomachy 6y ago
      Yeah, Canada was looking really good compared to the US back in the summer... but recently things have kind of gone to shit for both countries and the outcomes are pretty indistinguishable now. I don't really know enough to comment on what changed, maybe random chance is a big factor like you say. The only good thing is that my family and friends in Canada have stopped making smug comments about the superiority of the country...

petertodd 6y ago

> You’re ignoring that you getting vaccinated is not about you, but about protecting others. No I'm not. I'm not at all worried about contracting covid. At my age and health, the science is very clear that COVID-19 poses almost no risk to me. The only reason I'd bother with a vaccine is to protect others. But protecting others doesn't just mean protecting others now. It also means protecting others in the future. Bad government is a _serious_ risk. > I don’t know what country you live in, but many countries have the same assessment of many vaccines. I wasn't talking about science in relation to vaccines. I was talking about science in relation to the entire policy. I do not believe my government (Canada) is making decisions based on science in its use of emergency powers in general. That's pretty clear by the fact that they're unable to justify so many of the decisions made with actual numbers and models. Emergency powers are dangerous tools. We hope they get reserved for situations where the benefit is worth the risk. But after seeing how badly, and unscientifically. government has handled the entire pandemic, I want to see those emergency powers further restricted, so they aren't so easy to use in the future. edit: Note how Trump has told the FDA chief that his options were to approve the Pfizer vaccine or resign: https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/12/11/trump-stephen-hahn-fda-covid-vaccine/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/12/11/trump-steph... What a terrible precedent for science.

titanomachy 6y ago
> I do not believe my government (Canada) is making decisions based on science As a Canadian currently living in the US, it seems to me like Canada has handled things better out of the two countries... less than half the deaths per capita, and they managed to avoid the hospital overloading that happened in some states. Putting a lid on international travel early on seemed to make a big difference for Canada, as well as having a nationwide quarantine requirement. I understand the sentiment though. When I visited Canada this year, the border agent read me sections of the Quarantine Act and I was pretty astonished at the extent of federal powers and penalties that had been created on such short notice. The maximum penalty for violating quarantine is a million dollar fine and three years in prison.
- petertodd 6y ago
  > less than half the deaths per capita There's so much luck involved in those figures at any given point, not to mention the influence of different definitions and testing strategies, that I wouldn't make the claim that Canada is doing better or worse based on stats like that. Just look at the huge differences between different states (and in Canada's case, provinces). After all, two months ago you might have said that Sweden did much worse than the EU. Yet at this moment, the EU average reported deaths-per-capita is just slightly below Sweden's, with many countries significantly above.
  - titanomachy 6y ago
    Yeah, Canada was looking really good compared to the US back in the summer... but recently things have kind of gone to shit for both countries and the outcomes are pretty indistinguishable now. I don't really know enough to comment on what changed, maybe random chance is a big factor like you say. The only good thing is that my family and friends in Canada have stopped making smug comments about the superiority of the country...