7 ms·

It's quite irresponsible to try and coerce people who don't need treatment to accept it as well

munk-a 5y ago
No it isn't - it's providing unified and clear guidance on vaccination. I'm up in Canada where vaccine hesitancy has been almost unheard of[1] and those who refuse to get vaccinated, excepting those that can't for medical reasons, are ostracized for their overtly selfish actions. The US, though, has a real problem with disinformation being accepted more readily than fact. I am fine with the theory of having a nuanced and technical discussion of vaccine efficacy but I think it's pretty clear that that discussion can't happen in the public forum due to continued calls that hydroxychloroquine is an equally valid solution. 1. https://ourworldindata.org/explorers/coronavirus-data-explorer?zoomToSelection=true&pickerSort=desc&pickerMetric=total_vaccinations&Interval=Cumulative&Relative+to+Population=true&Align+outbreaks=false&country=CAN~USA&Metric=Vaccine+doses https://ourworldindata.org/explorers/coronavirus-data-explor...
- sjwalter 5y ago
  As a Canadian who emigrated to the US, the attitude you so proudly display--ostracizing people who aren't convinced of a novel vaccine with zero long-term safety information--makes me so happy I live here.
  - peter422 5y ago
    How sure are you about the long term effects of COVID?
    - sjwalter 5y ago
      Oh, not very sure at all. However, I may have already have it, so that cat's out of the bag (and invalidates any reason to get the vaccine anyways). Or I may never get it. Taking the vaccine, which includes three brand new medical technologies and has not completed phase3 trial, guarantees me taking that risk. I am extremely healthy, have a great diet, and as a farmer, I get plenty of time soaking up vitamin D, a potent inhibitor of covid. The vaccine doesn't make any sense for me to take. Normal disclaimer, I am a huge, huge believer in vaccines, and am probably more vaccinated (due to travel and other circumstances) than nearly everyone reading this comment. I believe bar none vaccines are the medical technology that has saved the most lives in our history as a species. Big fan of vaccines. But, vaccines are made safe via clinical trials and long-term studies. These vaccines are wholly new in type, were rushed to market, have liability waivers for those pushing them, and to make things even worse, the manufacturers aren't collecting followup data about adverse events in any kind of systematic way (as they would during a normal phase4). So it seems to me the playbook that gave us generations of safe vaccines that saved billions of lives has been thrown out the window. No thanks!
      - lame-robot-hoax 5y ago
        You have no clue what you are talking about and have spouted multiple falsehoods in your comment, especially in regards to phase 3 trials not being completed (they are) and that they are not conducting follow ups for an extended period of time (again, they are). https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-covid-vaccines-idUSL1N2M70MW https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-covid-vaccines-idU... They have filed for full authorization for a reason. These vaccines have enough data backing their safety for full approval.
        sjwalter 5y ago
        I don't know where you're getting your information from, but what I stated is very easy to validate and I'm completely correct. Here are the links to the actual FDA trials for the different major co vid vaccines on clinicaltrials.gov as well as their associated estimated completion dates. All are currently in Phase 3 trials. (Aside, it's not clear how they will complete reporting for these trials as the companies blew up the placebo arms of the study. I guess that's another role I can play in this pandemic, being the control arm of the experimental trials currently underway.) Please do not spread misinformation, especially misinformation about healthcare during a deadly and dangerous pandemic. Lives are at stake. Moderna's FDA trial: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04470427 https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04470427 Estimated Study Completion Date: October 27, 2022 Pfizer's FDA trial: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04368728 https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04368728 Estimated Study Completion Date: May 2, 2023 JnJ's FDA trial: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04505722 https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04505722 Estimated Study Completion Date: January 2, 2023
        lame-robot-hoax 5y ago
        You obviously didn’t read my link as it addresses exactly what you’re saying in your comment. Study completion date does not mean phase 3 trial completion date. “ However, these dates do not mean clinical trials will continue for this long, and instead reference continued safety monitoring after the vaccine has been approved and rolled out, which is standard practice within the industry” https://www.pfizer.com/news/press-release/press-release-detail/pfizer-and-biontech-conclude-phase-3-study-covid-19-vaccine https://www.pfizer.com/news/press-release/press-release-deta... Get a clue. Lives are at stake. Vaccination will save them. The majority of people dying now are dying because they made the choice not to get vaccinated.
  - croes 5y ago
    Did I miss the long term safety information of the corona virus?
  - wait_a_minute 5y ago
    Hear hear. That will never be the norm in the United States of America, no matter what some cliques and bubbles online seem to think.
  - mrj 5y ago
    It's not novel, this technology has been trialed and used for a decade, 3 years in vaccines. We do already have long-term data. You would see side effects for a vaccine within six months, and we have been administering it for much longer than that. The vaccines are safe. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7956899/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7956899/
    - sjwalter 5y ago
      This is incredibly misleading. I used to be a close follower of the pharma industry, and you're making it seem like FDA trials happen on molecules and formulations somewhat related to the proposed formulation and then are, like, transitively approved on that hand-wavey basis. This is totally wrong. For reasons that should be obvious to any engineer that's worked on any kind of even moderately complex system, the molecule that is tested and trialed is the molecule that goes to production. You don't test "the technology" and then some unrelated other vaccine and then say, there we go, this one's safe. You test the actual formulation that will go to production. This can't have happened for this yet. The trials are still underway. Unknown risk. I dunno if you're misinformed or a troll, but that's dangerous stuff to be putting out there. Vaccines are amazing life-saving tech, and they're safe because of our cultural technologies (FDA trials for e.g.) that make them safe. You can't take all the safety gear out and still get the same safety rating. Doesn't make sense, lol.
      - munk-a 5y ago
        The flu shot that's available each year doesn't undergo long term trials - it actually usually goes through about nine months to a year of trials due to predictions on what the flu outbreak will look like - but even then the substance is a reconfiguration of technology with new details being integrated. In some areas of medicine we can afford to move slowly and we absolutely should - but when it comes to the flu we don't have that luxury.
        jaywalk 5y ago
        And outside of some specific professions, the yearly flu shot is entirely optional. We don't have people running around screaming that you're a murderer or that you should be excluded from society if you choose not to get it. It's a personal medical decision, and that's the end of it.
- incrudible 5y ago
  > I'm up in Canada where vaccine hesitancy has been almost unheard of[1] and those who refuse to get vaccinated, excepting those that can't for medical reasons, are ostracized for their overtly selfish actions. In other words, those who value individual freedom might want to avoid Canada for its over-boarding groupthink and overtly collectivist mentality.
  - munk-a 5y ago
    I actually strongly disagree with this point. America has a very precise definition of individual freedom that I disagree with - it's a big part of why I emigrated. In the US you're absolutely free to die as you wish - in Canada you're free to live a healthy life and do with that life what you may. Socialism and socialized healthcare frequently gets painted as being anti-freedom but I think that the lack of socialized healthcare infringes more effectively on individual freedoms than the presence of it. In the case of vaccinations - encouraging widespread vaccination (and there is currently and probably will never be a mandate) allows more of the population to act freely. Canada is only behind on vaccinations (and, in total doses administered we're now actually tied) due to the fact that we don't have domestic production facilities which resulted on our dose orders being delayed until America dealt with their domestic population. I don't think that's unfair and I've been pretty critical of the LPC that failed to build out domestic production facilities early into the pandemic but - eh, we work with what we've got. I think you are projecting what you view as two options in America - either communism or individual freedoms - onto the rest of the world. That is a myopic approach to take when considering all the cultures and governments in the world.
    - sjwalter 5y ago
      Lack of socialized healthcare? The USA has at least 3 times as many people on government healthcare than the entire population of Canada (Medicare, Medicaid, the VA). The USA has the second- third-largest government-run healthcare system in the world. As a person who lived 20 years in Canada and 14 in the USA, I'll take the USA every day of the week--and for the past year I've paid for my own health insurance directly. Canada's healthcare system is run by bureaucrats who prioritize many items ahead of citizen health. Here's one example: A family member is a police officer. While I was visiting home, in Ontario, he was hit with some insane shoulder-related pain. This is one tough guy and he was reduced to tears--some kind of nerve damage or something. The hospital in Canada told him he needed an MRI. And that it would take between 4 and 6 months til there was an available slot. They gave him a prescription for strong opiates to manage the pain during his wait. I drove him over the border to Buffalo, shelled out $500, and he had his MRI in less than half an hour. The drive was longer than the wait in the radiology clinic. There are tradeoffs in every situation. I think Canada's healthcare system is better in one exact way: Nobody's bankrupted of their financial wealth due to healthcare. But many many many Canucks are bankrupted of their actual health, their time, their human wealth, due to healthcare.
- kQq9oHeAz6wLLS 5y ago
  > are ostracized That sounds like hell.
  - stronglikedan 5y ago
    > hell My Canadian friends seem to think that's what their country has turned into, and on just about every front, not just vaccines.
    - sjwalter 5y ago
      Yea, I unfortunately have a lot of friends and family still there, and almost all of them are not gonna take the vaccine and find the social environment very taxing. But, they are still OK, because they know we're never given any challenge to great for our spirits to overcome.
- YawningAngel 5y ago
  This has nothing to do with what I said. You are reacting to anti-vaccine views other people have that are not expressed in my comment. I said that _if_ Covid-19 infection confers equal levels of protection to vaccination then it is irresponsible to try and coerce people who have been infected to get vaccinations they don't need. I have said nothing about anything else. If you have issues with what those people have said you should take it up with them
  - andybak 5y ago
    To be fair, your comment was rather nebulous. If you're going to comment on a topic that tends to polarize people, then it's wise to be slightly more explicit in one's statements.
mustacheemperor 5y ago
What you are saying is contrary to the tack already taken towards the eradication of other endemic lethal diseases and pests such as River Blindness. That example has been eradicated through much of the Americas primarily by treating everyone in an affected community with ivermectin, which has the effect of slowing transmission from all of the infected individuals in the community (including those who don't know they are infected) and does not harm uninfected individuals. With attitudes like the one you are quoting, it would never work.

No it isn't - it's providing unified and clear guidance on vaccination. I'm up in Canada where vaccine hesitancy has been almost unheard of[1] and those who refuse to get vaccinated, excepting those that can't for medical reasons, are ostracized for their overtly selfish actions. The US, though, has a real problem with disinformation being accepted more readily than fact. I am fine with the theory of having a nuanced and technical discussion of vaccine efficacy but I think it's pretty clear that that discussion can't happen in the public forum due to continued calls that hydroxychloroquine is an equally valid solution. 1. https://ourworldindata.org/explorers/coronavirus-data-explorer?zoomToSelection=true&pickerSort=desc&pickerMetric=total_vaccinations&Interval=Cumulative&Relative+to+Population=true&Align+outbreaks=false&country=CAN~USA&Metric=Vaccine+doses https://ourworldindata.org/explorers/coronavirus-data-explor...

sjwalter 5y ago
As a Canadian who emigrated to the US, the attitude you so proudly display--ostracizing people who aren't convinced of a novel vaccine with zero long-term safety information--makes me so happy I live here.
- peter422 5y ago
  How sure are you about the long term effects of COVID?
  - sjwalter 5y ago
    Oh, not very sure at all. However, I may have already have it, so that cat's out of the bag (and invalidates any reason to get the vaccine anyways). Or I may never get it. Taking the vaccine, which includes three brand new medical technologies and has not completed phase3 trial, guarantees me taking that risk. I am extremely healthy, have a great diet, and as a farmer, I get plenty of time soaking up vitamin D, a potent inhibitor of covid. The vaccine doesn't make any sense for me to take. Normal disclaimer, I am a huge, huge believer in vaccines, and am probably more vaccinated (due to travel and other circumstances) than nearly everyone reading this comment. I believe bar none vaccines are the medical technology that has saved the most lives in our history as a species. Big fan of vaccines. But, vaccines are made safe via clinical trials and long-term studies. These vaccines are wholly new in type, were rushed to market, have liability waivers for those pushing them, and to make things even worse, the manufacturers aren't collecting followup data about adverse events in any kind of systematic way (as they would during a normal phase4). So it seems to me the playbook that gave us generations of safe vaccines that saved billions of lives has been thrown out the window. No thanks!
    - lame-robot-hoax 5y ago
      You have no clue what you are talking about and have spouted multiple falsehoods in your comment, especially in regards to phase 3 trials not being completed (they are) and that they are not conducting follow ups for an extended period of time (again, they are). https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-covid-vaccines-idUSL1N2M70MW https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-covid-vaccines-idU... They have filed for full authorization for a reason. These vaccines have enough data backing their safety for full approval.
      - sjwalter 5y ago
        I don't know where you're getting your information from, but what I stated is very easy to validate and I'm completely correct. Here are the links to the actual FDA trials for the different major co vid vaccines on clinicaltrials.gov as well as their associated estimated completion dates. All are currently in Phase 3 trials. (Aside, it's not clear how they will complete reporting for these trials as the companies blew up the placebo arms of the study. I guess that's another role I can play in this pandemic, being the control arm of the experimental trials currently underway.) Please do not spread misinformation, especially misinformation about healthcare during a deadly and dangerous pandemic. Lives are at stake. Moderna's FDA trial: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04470427 https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04470427 Estimated Study Completion Date: October 27, 2022 Pfizer's FDA trial: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04368728 https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04368728 Estimated Study Completion Date: May 2, 2023 JnJ's FDA trial: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04505722 https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04505722 Estimated Study Completion Date: January 2, 2023
        lame-robot-hoax 5y ago
        You obviously didn’t read my link as it addresses exactly what you’re saying in your comment. Study completion date does not mean phase 3 trial completion date. “ However, these dates do not mean clinical trials will continue for this long, and instead reference continued safety monitoring after the vaccine has been approved and rolled out, which is standard practice within the industry” https://www.pfizer.com/news/press-release/press-release-detail/pfizer-and-biontech-conclude-phase-3-study-covid-19-vaccine https://www.pfizer.com/news/press-release/press-release-deta... Get a clue. Lives are at stake. Vaccination will save them. The majority of people dying now are dying because they made the choice not to get vaccinated.
- croes 5y ago
  Did I miss the long term safety information of the corona virus?
- wait_a_minute 5y ago
  Hear hear. That will never be the norm in the United States of America, no matter what some cliques and bubbles online seem to think.
- mrj 5y ago
  It's not novel, this technology has been trialed and used for a decade, 3 years in vaccines. We do already have long-term data. You would see side effects for a vaccine within six months, and we have been administering it for much longer than that. The vaccines are safe. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7956899/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7956899/
  - sjwalter 5y ago
    This is incredibly misleading. I used to be a close follower of the pharma industry, and you're making it seem like FDA trials happen on molecules and formulations somewhat related to the proposed formulation and then are, like, transitively approved on that hand-wavey basis. This is totally wrong. For reasons that should be obvious to any engineer that's worked on any kind of even moderately complex system, the molecule that is tested and trialed is the molecule that goes to production. You don't test "the technology" and then some unrelated other vaccine and then say, there we go, this one's safe. You test the actual formulation that will go to production. This can't have happened for this yet. The trials are still underway. Unknown risk. I dunno if you're misinformed or a troll, but that's dangerous stuff to be putting out there. Vaccines are amazing life-saving tech, and they're safe because of our cultural technologies (FDA trials for e.g.) that make them safe. You can't take all the safety gear out and still get the same safety rating. Doesn't make sense, lol.
    - munk-a 5y ago
      The flu shot that's available each year doesn't undergo long term trials - it actually usually goes through about nine months to a year of trials due to predictions on what the flu outbreak will look like - but even then the substance is a reconfiguration of technology with new details being integrated. In some areas of medicine we can afford to move slowly and we absolutely should - but when it comes to the flu we don't have that luxury.
      - jaywalk 5y ago
        And outside of some specific professions, the yearly flu shot is entirely optional. We don't have people running around screaming that you're a murderer or that you should be excluded from society if you choose not to get it. It's a personal medical decision, and that's the end of it.
incrudible 5y ago
> I'm up in Canada where vaccine hesitancy has been almost unheard of[1] and those who refuse to get vaccinated, excepting those that can't for medical reasons, are ostracized for their overtly selfish actions. In other words, those who value individual freedom might want to avoid Canada for its over-boarding groupthink and overtly collectivist mentality.
- munk-a 5y ago
  I actually strongly disagree with this point. America has a very precise definition of individual freedom that I disagree with - it's a big part of why I emigrated. In the US you're absolutely free to die as you wish - in Canada you're free to live a healthy life and do with that life what you may. Socialism and socialized healthcare frequently gets painted as being anti-freedom but I think that the lack of socialized healthcare infringes more effectively on individual freedoms than the presence of it. In the case of vaccinations - encouraging widespread vaccination (and there is currently and probably will never be a mandate) allows more of the population to act freely. Canada is only behind on vaccinations (and, in total doses administered we're now actually tied) due to the fact that we don't have domestic production facilities which resulted on our dose orders being delayed until America dealt with their domestic population. I don't think that's unfair and I've been pretty critical of the LPC that failed to build out domestic production facilities early into the pandemic but - eh, we work with what we've got. I think you are projecting what you view as two options in America - either communism or individual freedoms - onto the rest of the world. That is a myopic approach to take when considering all the cultures and governments in the world.
  - sjwalter 5y ago
    Lack of socialized healthcare? The USA has at least 3 times as many people on government healthcare than the entire population of Canada (Medicare, Medicaid, the VA). The USA has the second- third-largest government-run healthcare system in the world. As a person who lived 20 years in Canada and 14 in the USA, I'll take the USA every day of the week--and for the past year I've paid for my own health insurance directly. Canada's healthcare system is run by bureaucrats who prioritize many items ahead of citizen health. Here's one example: A family member is a police officer. While I was visiting home, in Ontario, he was hit with some insane shoulder-related pain. This is one tough guy and he was reduced to tears--some kind of nerve damage or something. The hospital in Canada told him he needed an MRI. And that it would take between 4 and 6 months til there was an available slot. They gave him a prescription for strong opiates to manage the pain during his wait. I drove him over the border to Buffalo, shelled out $500, and he had his MRI in less than half an hour. The drive was longer than the wait in the radiology clinic. There are tradeoffs in every situation. I think Canada's healthcare system is better in one exact way: Nobody's bankrupted of their financial wealth due to healthcare. But many many many Canucks are bankrupted of their actual health, their time, their human wealth, due to healthcare.
kQq9oHeAz6wLLS 5y ago
> are ostracized That sounds like hell.
- stronglikedan 5y ago
  > hell My Canadian friends seem to think that's what their country has turned into, and on just about every front, not just vaccines.
  - sjwalter 5y ago
    Yea, I unfortunately have a lot of friends and family still there, and almost all of them are not gonna take the vaccine and find the social environment very taxing. But, they are still OK, because they know we're never given any challenge to great for our spirits to overcome.
YawningAngel 5y ago
This has nothing to do with what I said. You are reacting to anti-vaccine views other people have that are not expressed in my comment. I said that _if_ Covid-19 infection confers equal levels of protection to vaccination then it is irresponsible to try and coerce people who have been infected to get vaccinations they don't need. I have said nothing about anything else. If you have issues with what those people have said you should take it up with them
- andybak 5y ago
  To be fair, your comment was rather nebulous. If you're going to comment on a topic that tends to polarize people, then it's wise to be slightly more explicit in one's statements.

mustacheemperor 5y ago

What you are saying is contrary to the tack already taken towards the eradication of other endemic lethal diseases and pests such as River Blindness. That example has been eradicated through much of the Americas primarily by treating everyone in an affected community with ivermectin, which has the effect of slowing transmission from all of the infected individuals in the community (including those who don't know they are infected) and does not harm uninfected individuals. With attitudes like the one you are quoting, it would never work.