19 ms·

Google Offices to Mandate Vaccines

162 points by nevir 5y ago

Whatarethese 5y ago
Good. Its time to stop messing around with this. The vaccines are tested and are safe.
- psalminen 5y ago
  My only issue is with this line: >> employees could continue working from home through Oct. 18. I agree that they should mandate vaccines for in office. But if they do so, I don't think they should force people into the office.
  - alistairSH 5y ago
    If Google believes their employees are more productive in the office, why shouldn't they do everything in their power to get the workforce back into the office?
    - oceliker 5y ago
      Productivity is (hopefully) not the only metric — employee happiness is important too.
      - smueller1234 5y ago
        And survival.
        alistairSH 5y ago
        Thus the vaccination requirement. I don't agree with Google on returning to the office (at all, irrespective of COVID), but frankly at this point, almost anything that improves vaccine rates is fine with me. The sooner we're all vaccinated, the sooner we can return to normal life.
        thisiscorrect 5y ago
        That may not be how things play out. Vaccination may facilitate immune escape[1] "Given that therapeutics (vaccines and antibody-based therapies) target mainly the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein, the selection pressures that favour the emergence of new variants carrying immune escape mutations generated in chronic infections24,25,26 will be similar to those selecting for mutations that allow reinfections within the wider population27,28,29. Therefore, sequencing of viruses associated with prolonged infections will provide useful information on mutations that could contribute to increased transmissibility or escape from vaccine-mediated immunity." [1] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41579-021-00573-0 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41579-021-00573-0
        alistairSH 5y ago
        Wouldn't that more likely apply in the case where we have significant vaccination rates, but NOT yet at the level of herd immunity? IE, if we're vaccinated to the point of herd immunity, this ceases to be a problem? To be otherwise would tend to imply smallpox and other vaccines should already have evolved, no?
        thisiscorrect 5y ago
        I think you mean "smallpox and other viruses should already have evolved." The difference is that the smallpox vaccine prevented infection of the vaccinated. That's not the case for existing SARS-CoV-2 vaccines. https://www.verywellhealth.com/covid-19-vaccines-and-sterilizing-immunity-5092148 https://www.verywellhealth.com/covid-19-vaccines-and-sterili... gives an approachable overview of the difference. Smallpox was eradicated. The likelihood of the same happening to SARS-CoV-2 is lower. At least, it would be the first example of a respiratory infection being eliminated. Influenza hasn't been eradicated and it does continue to evolve. More broadly, the idea of "immune escape" is hardly something I can lay claim to. You can read about it in existing literature.
    - mupuff1234 5y ago
      Only if you think the "productivity" metric trumps everything else.
  - heavenlyblue 5y ago
    > But if they do so, I don't think they should force people into the office. They could just fire them otherwise?
  - tfehring 5y ago
    "Mandate" means something very different when performed by a private employer than by a government entity. In the former case it means something like "make continued employment conditional upon." Google employees are perfectly free to decide they're no longer satisfied with the conditions of their employment and find new jobs elsewhere instead. Edited to add: In terms of whether Google "should" do so, I assume they've thought through the trade-off of increased attrition vs. reduced risk of COVID outbreaks (among other factors) and decided that allowing unvaccinated people to either go back to the office or work remotely would be a net negative for the company.
    - sharken 5y ago
      I thought Google was better than this, guess not.
    - kyruzic 5y ago
      Do you really believe Google is ready to lose at least 20% of their staff? That would be a horrible decision especially in the market we are currently in. These people will easily find jobs elsewhere.
      - tfehring 5y ago
        I doubt Google will lose anywhere close to 20% of its staff, and I assume Google doubts that too. I expect the rest of FAANG+ will follow suit, and there won't be that many jobs where you can earn a FAANG-level salary without being vaccinated (either because they're fully remote or otherwise). When push comes to shove I don't think that many people will be willing to take six-figure pay cuts.
  - UncleMeat 5y ago
    Google has set up a bunch of alternative options ranging from permanent remote work to temporary extensions of up to a year. If people don't feel comfortable coming back on the date, it isn't hard to stay at home longer.
- symlinkk 5y ago
  They aren’t fully tested, they have emergency FDA approval but haven’t finished the standard approval process yet.
  - bastardoperator 5y ago
    They are fully tested with continued scrutiny. They have been given emergency approval and granted priority review. There is quantifiable fact and evidence that these vaccines are very effective and safe. Both of the mRNA vaccines are scheduled for full approval in Jan/Feb of 2022.
    - kyruzic 5y ago
      This is a lie. There is still testing going on to confirm their safety and effectiveness. Here is a list of them: https://www.pfizer.com/science/find-a-trial/search/BNT162b2/?distance=1000&items_per_page=10 https://www.pfizer.com/science/find-a-trial/search/BNT162b2/...
      - bastardoperator 5y ago
        "continued scrutiny"... In terms of efficacy and safety, the facts are undeniable. No medication is perfect. If you've ever seen an advertisement for medicine, many of them come without side effects that outweigh the risk of not taking the medication. Depending on where you live, I'd look to the government, versus Pfizer's website for clinical trial details: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/results/details?cond=covid https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/results/details?cond=covid
- hanoz 5y ago
  They are not tested long term.
  - veemjeem 5y ago
    Are there any vaccines in history that have caused something unexpected 10 years from injection?
    - astura 5y ago
      No. https://www.muhealth.org/our-stories/how-do-we-know-covid-19-vaccine-wont-have-long-term-side-effects https://www.muhealth.org/our-stories/how-do-we-know-covid-19... >When new vaccines are released, the unknown side effects, if any, show up within two months of vaccination. This history goes back to at least the 1960s with the oral polio vaccine and examples continue through today. Beyond that you have to look at this in context - the probability of being harmed by COVID-19 vaccine (including long term) vs the probability of being harmed by a COVID-19 infection (including long term). The vaccine have the lower probability of harm by a very large magnitude.
    - nevir 5y ago
      Have we had any other mRNA based vaccines in the past? (genuinely curious)
      - aaomidi 5y ago
        There are vaccines you can get that aren't mRNA based.
        endisneigh 5y ago
        I'm genuinely curious if you could sue Google if you got J&J because of their mandate and you happened to be one of the extremely rare folks who got a blood clot from it.
        pb7 5y ago
- criddell 5y ago
  Why are the major COVID-19 vaccines still under FDA emergency use authorization guidelines? What's preventing the FDA from dropping those special rules and treating the vaccine like every other vaccine?
  - pb7 5y ago
    Because full authorization takes time. The speed in rolling out emergency use vaccination was by the book. Speeding up full authorization would not be.
    - lancemurdock 5y ago
      interesting precedent for the future. Whats an 'emergency'? Whats is the point of an FDA review at this point?
      - pb7 5y ago
        When the cost of not taking action (not vaccinating) exceeds the cost of taking action (vaccinating).
        lancemurdock 5y ago
        thats an incredibly loose definition and up for manipulation
        roberttod 5y ago
        The FDA decides what counts as an emergency, and if they wanted to manipulate the approval process then that would be the least of our problems. Further, if we can't react to a pandemic which could be even quicker spreading and more deadly than covid because we're unable to lower the risk tolerance for a cure/vaccine then that seems to be complete against any common sense.
        lancemurdock 5y ago
- jakebasile 5y ago
  I too think it's great when an employer with all the power forces employees to submit to medical procedures against their will in order to continue earning a living. My body my choice, right? Wow, I've never gotten a comment flagged in my years of being here, let alone within minutes! Good to see this a fruitful unbiased discussion forum.
  - aaomidi 5y ago
    This is what happens when you fetishize corporatism and jail and silence people who have been critical of capitalism. Would people be up to seize the means of production now? Or would we still keep arguing that companies can do whatever they want?
    - BHSPitMonkey 5y ago
      If all of Google's intelligent employees were to rise up and seize control of the company today, they would enact the same office vaccination requirement that Sundar is announcing here.
      - aaomidi 5y ago
        Probably, but it would be a communal requirement rather than a top-down requirement.
        UncleMeat 5y ago
        I'm pretty confident that AWU supports this policy.
        aaomidi 5y ago
        There was a misunderstanding here, I'm also for the vaccine requirement. However, I am also questioning "what can an employer mandate?" There's something to be said about where the enforcement is coming from and how it's being applied.
        5y ago
- neither_color 5y ago
  I'm vaccinated and I personally don't care if others choose not to do it.
  - orhmeh09 5y ago
    Why? Aren’t you worried that a patchily vaccinated population still provides a good (possibly even better) breeding ground for new variants?
    - native_samples 5y ago
      I'm not. This argument is not reasonable and looks suspiciously like working backwards from a desired outcome to something that sounds like a scientific justification. Firstly, the vaccines seem "effective" against variants, using the current definition of effectiveness of just reducing symptoms. Secondly, no vaccine in history has come with a disclaimer that it doesn't work unless 100% of the population is vaccinated. That's not the definition of what vaccines do. Vaccines give individual protection. If these vaccines had been advertised as requiring that, would they have been approved? It is hard to see how because believing this raises fundamental questions, questions like: given that people cannot all be vaccinated simultaneously, how quickly is it required to get to 100% vaccination before the vaccine becomes useless? This variable would seem to be critical for any such "vaccine" yet no such time dimension is available, probably because no study would have ever been created to try and discover that - because there's no scientific basis for determining it. Thirdly, governments were saying very clearly that estimates of herd immunity were in the 60-70% range - very far from everyone. Why are people now claiming that this was wrong? On what basis? And if it was wrong, why should anyone believe any claims about vaccines at all?
      - pseudalopex 5y ago
        > Firstly, the vaccines seem "effective" against variants, using the current definition of effectiveness of just reducing symptoms. Effectiveness against current variants doesn't guarantee effectiveness against future variants. "Just" reducing symptoms keeps people out of hospitals and graves. > Secondly, no vaccine in history has come with a disclaimer that it doesn't work unless 100% of the population is vaccinated. Straw man. > Vaccines give individual protection. And herd immunity when enough people get them. > Thirdly, governments were saying very clearly that estimates of herd immunity were in the 60-70% range - very far from everyone. Why are people now claiming that this was wrong? I very clearly heard up to 90% of the population. And we wouldn't know until people got vaccinated. Governments then set lower targets like 70% of adults. Probably they decided they couldn't persuade 90% of the population. Those weren't herd immunity estimates though. Some estimates have gone up because the delta variant is more transmissible. Moreover most countries are under 60% vaccinated.
- hereforphone 5y ago
  I have taken both shots. But I wouldn't call them "safe", as they are young and approved under emergency guidelines. They are probably safe, but nobody knows that right now.
  - giarc 5y ago
    There's been nearly 4 billion shots delivered across the world in the past 8 months. I suspect if they were to cause great harm, we would have known by now.
    - freedomben 5y ago
      Some vaccines take years or even decades to show harm. See Air Force pilots and Anthrax vaccine history. Rare but devastating consequences. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with the covid vax. I got Pfizer myself as soon as it was available. But there is still room for doubt.
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
      - giarc 5y ago
        Sure, but the harm from COVID is pretty evident in the 600,000 deaths in the states in the past 18 months. No one has said the vaccine is 100% safe, it does list side effects after all, but this whole notion of "I'm waiting until all the data is out/it's only approved for emergency use" is just nonsensical.
        bruceb 5y ago
        If you are young and in shape, then the likely hood of you dying is extremely low.
        pb7 5y ago
        Except if there are severe consequences that will only arise years down the line, which we're already seeing, right?
- h_anna_h 5y ago
  Do they actually reduce spread or do they instead just make people who catch it more likely to avoid hospitalization and increase their survival chances? If it is the first I can see why they do it, if it is the second then I do not see the point of enforcing it. Although I wonder if they will consider workers who passed covid before (and thus have antibodies) as "vaccinated". > The vaccines are tested and are safe Weren't there various (rare) occurrences of serious side effects? (such as the blood clot thing for astra and jonson or myocarditis for pfizer and moderna)
  - majormajor 5y ago
    From the data I've seen, they are potentially looking more effective at preventing cases than at preventing hospitalization: https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-07-22/los-angeles-covid-june-vaccine-breakthrough-cases https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-07-22/los-ange... > Among fully vaccinated people, there were about 27 coronavirus infections for every 100,000 county residents in June, according to figures presented Thursday. But among people not fully vaccinated, there were 125 infections for every 100,000 residents. > That month, there were also 2 fully vaccinated people hospitalized for every 100,000 residents — much smaller than the comparable rate, 11, for people not fully vaccinated. So per 100k fully vaccinated people, 27 cases and 2 hospitalizations. Or: 7.4% of cases resulting in hospitalization. Per 100k not-fully-vaccinated: 125 cases and 11 hospitalizations. Or: 8.8% of cases resulting in hospitalization. What this doesn't tell us is "how many cases were so mild and occurred in people who aren't getting test regularly that they went under the radar." I don't know of any data telling us anything about what the "mild case rate" looks like for vaccinated vs unvaccinated (it would be VERY hard to measure without widespread mandatory testing). But if you've got a case that gets detected, the vaccine doesn't really seem to prevent that case from hospitalizing you at the same rate as before. It just prevents you from getting those cases nearly as frequently as the rest of the population.
    - cowl 5y ago
      UK statstics show a 20 factor reduction in hospitalisation rates for vaccinated people vs non vaccinated. However what is not considered in all these statistics is the non-symtomatic cases. If hospitalisation rate is 20 times lower it means also that symtomatic infections are way lower than those detected. In your cited statistics for those 27 cases there would be a lot more not diagnosed at all. The risk here is that although they will pass it without notice they will also risk infecting others-hence the recomandation that vaccinated people still need to use masks. There is a great risk on falling into complancy here if we think vaccination is the silver bullet and is enough.
- bwship 5y ago
  Didn't Billy Joel sing: "Lebanon, Charles de Gaulle California baseball Starkweather Homicide Children of Covid-19 Vaccine"
- sharken 5y ago
  The problem is not the vaccine by itself, it is that you no longer have a say in what happens with your body. I guess switching jobs is the only cure for this unfortunate trend.
  - bradstewart 5y ago
    I don't understand this argument. This isn't the first time vaccines have been required. For instance, every state has required vaccines for school attendance--from kindergarten through college. Here's the list for Texas: https://dshs.texas.gov/immunize/school/school-requirements.aspx https://dshs.texas.gov/immunize/school/school-requirements.a... Are you opposed to those mandates as well, or is this one different?
    - calvano915 5y ago
      Vaccines that are under EUA status?
    - sharken 5y ago
      This one is different. In my country in 2018, deaths caused by the flu was more than 50% of all registered Corona deaths. Just that season alone. Now some wants to mandate Corona vaccines, but then what about flu vaccines ?
      - bradstewart 5y ago
        Understood. I rarely get a straight answer to that question from people who make the "it's my body" argument, so I appreciate the reply.
      - pseudalopex 5y ago
        Did your country restrict or mandate anything to prevent COVID-19 spreading?
        MatteoFrigo 5y ago
        I don't know about GP's country, but http://euromomo.eu/ http://euromomo.eu/ has a lot of data whereby one can answer such questions for multiple countries in Europe.
- cbradford 5y ago
  That is a statement of opinion, not a fact. It is misinformation statements like this that need to be stamped out in social media.
  - gilbetron 5y ago
    1.1 billion fully vaccinated, maybe a few dozen deaths can be contributed. 200 million reported covid cases, if we go with typical estimates of 2-5X unreported, then we get to a similar number of just over a billion infected, with 4.2 million deaths, not to mention all the nasty "long covid" (hate the expression, btw) cases that are probably higher than that. Those are facts. You can say, without evidence, that the vaccines will cause your head to explode in 10 years, but I can say the same thing about Covid infections.
- jackTheMan 5y ago
  I hope people who don't take vaccine also ignore bio-engineered food. Wait it's not labeled in the US. So much about being scared of long term effect...
- TKWasRight 5y ago
  No they aren't. We don't have long term data so what you said cannot be proven or said to be accurate.
rootusrootus 5y ago
Where Google goes, I expect the rest of the tech companies (including companies that just fancy themselves as tech companies) to follow. This is that moment when everyone is reminded of "at will" employment.
- peder 5y ago
  Tech companies won't move in lockstep on this. Battle for talent is too intense, not many companies can call shots like this like Google can. Some companies will be glad to differentiate to try and attract Googlers that do not want to return to the office, that do not want to be vaccinated (tho I think the number of tech workers that are not vax'd is small)
  - giarc 5y ago
    I agree, I suspect that very few Googlers will be unvaxxed and that trying to identify these individuals and poach them will be tough. Not a good look if other tech companies are specifically bringing in non-vaccinated employees. Might create issues with current employees.
    - xxxtentachyon 5y ago
      Yeah, and on the demand side, I have a hunch that a company that implicitly or explicitly uses their lack of a vaccine requirement as a recruiting pitch would have a hard time recruiting a large subset of engineers.
      - giarc 5y ago
        The venn diagram of unvaxxed, exceptional engineers, willing to move to a new company is probably very, very small.
        Trasmatta 5y ago
        With the amount of ridiculous anti-vaxxing statements in this thread, I'm beginning to think there may actually be a large contingent of software engineers deciding not to be vaccinated.
astura 5y ago
You will see a lot more of this in the coming days. A lot of non-medical companies/organizations were waiting for full FDA approval before requiring vaccines to make doubly sure they are following the law. The Justice Department posted an opinion yesterday saying it's legal to require vaccinations that are approved under EUA. https://www.cnn.com/2021/07/26/politics/doj-covid-19-vaccine-requirements-olc-opinion/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2021/07/26/politics/doj-covid-19-vaccine... California State University responded by requiring students to get COVID-19 vaccines even if they are only approved under EUA, previously they had said their policy was to require them when FDA gave full approval. https://www2.calstate.edu/csu-system/news/Pages/California-State-University-to-Implement-COVID-19-Vaccination-Requirement-for-Fall-2021-Term.aspx https://www2.calstate.edu/csu-system/news/Pages/California-S... Biden said that he expects full approval as early as late August. It's already been three months since Pfizer submitted their application for full approval, two since Moderna did.
Kenji 5y ago
They will lose a lot of smart people like this.
PragmaticPulp 5y ago
Looks like employees have until October 18th to be vaccinated and return to the office.: > Google announced Wednesday it would require all in-office workers and visitors to be vaccinated and that employees could continue working from home through Oct. 18. It's possible, perhaps even likely, that the vaccines will be fully FDA approved before that date (Source: FDA spokesperson speaking here https://www.cnn.com/2021/07/16/health/pfizer-covid-19-vaccine-fda-priority-review/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2021/07/16/health/pfizer-covid-19-vaccin... ) It should go without saying that they're obviously aware that some rare medical circumstances may not allow the vaccine. They have prepared an exceptions process for those people: > He said there will be "an exceptions process for those who cannot be vaccinated for medical or other protected reasons.
halfjoking 5y ago
All WHO approved vaccines? I'm thinking of leaving the country to try to get an inactive virus vaccine. I don't let anyone else run RNA code in my cells. The attack surface is too large.
- papaf 5y ago
  I don't let anyone else run RNA code in my cells I think that happens every time you catch a cold.
  - TheHypnotist 5y ago
    This is an example of the incredible ignorance around vaccines.
- safog 5y ago
  What exactly do you imagine will happen if your cells run someone else's RNA code? They already run someone else's RNA code when you get infected by any random virus.
  - halfjoking 5y ago
    There are more types of RNA than just mRNA. https://www.livescience.com/25988-rna-versatile-molecules.html https://www.livescience.com/25988-rna-versatile-molecules.ht... I'm not an expert so I'm not going to speculate which type might be used, but the risk that the government is using (soon to be mandatory) shots as a way to insert a biological backdoor into the masses far outweighs the risk of catching covid again. They want backdoors into all software systems... why wouldn't they want a backdoor into your biology? If not now, then what about when we're on our 5th booster? If I was dying on my bed from some crazy variant that the government was fearmongering, I would still think that my risk assessment was valid. I'd have no regrets.
    - majormajor 5y ago
      You shouldn't be willing to have any shot if that's your perception of the threat level. Why create a back door when you're literally opening a front door through the shot? Who gives a shit if it claims to be mRNA or not in that scenario? Don't breathe unfiltered air either. Why not just distribute this backdoor as an aerosol?
azangru 5y ago
So if an employee develops one of the rare adverse events, will Google be liable for damages?
- OgAstorga 5y ago
  I don’t think so. Everyone is free to leave if the don’t like the new policies. It’s not like there is a tight market for highly skilled software engineers
  - h_anna_h 5y ago
    This is a concerning argument. We have laws regarding labor for a reason. "I just decided to pay you below the minimum wage and not give you any days off" has not been considered acceptable for decades despite the employees being "free to leave if they do not like the new policies". Edit: I am arguing against the argument itself in general. Not specifically for the vaccine case.
    - summerlight 5y ago
      > "I just decided to pay you below the minimum wage and not give you any days off" That's a pure disadvantage against employees. Vaccine mandate is a bit different; it is about employee protection, especially for those subset who cannot get vaccines due to their health conditions.
bruceb 5y ago
The vaccines are safe and you will be fired for not taking it...also if something happens, you can't sue the vaccine makers.
- tablespoon 5y ago
  > ...also if something happens, you can't sue the vaccine makers. Because the liability has been centralized in a fund that will pay you damages: the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program. If "something happens," you'll still be compensated.
  - dragonwriter 5y ago
    > Because the liability has been centralized in a fund that will pay you damages: the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program. Actually, the Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program (CICP is broadly similar to VICP, but instead of general recommended routine vaccines, covers recommended pandemic/epidemic/etc. diagnostic, treatment, and prevention measures, inclusing vaccines not covered by VICP.) https://www.hrsa.gov/cicp/faq#covid https://www.hrsa.gov/cicp/faq#covid
nrclark 5y ago
This might act like an employee filter as well, so maybe it's a win-win from Google's perspective. There's a very high correlation between anti-vaxxers and those who buy into The Big Lie. As a society, we don't need to humor or cater to these people. Google is an at-will employer, which means that employee or employer can terminate the arrangement at any time. Employees who like the gravy train and feel entitled to the perks can choose to keep them, or they can go somewhere else.
Trasmatta 5y ago
The amount of thinly veiled (or actually outright blatant) anti-vax posts here on Hacker News is really disheartening.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- romesmoke 5y ago
  The amount of times people expressing mere skepticism (even here on Hacker News!) have been flagged as 'anti-vax' is also not that encouraging. Seeing tin foil hats everywhere is easy--and a trap.
- endisneigh 5y ago
  I'm curious, in your mind is someone who wants to be unvaccinated the same as anti-vax? Someone could be unvaccinated and not discourage the vaccinate and simultaneously not want the vaccination for themselves. Would that be an anti-vax position? full disclosure - I'm vaccinated with moderna.
- nomoreplease 5y ago
  Your comment is disheartening. Pretending there are absolutely zero side-effects to vaccines (or any medical practices) is anti-science
  - Trasmatta 5y ago
    > Pretending there are absolutely zero side-effects to vaccines I honestly don't know how you got this from my post.
    - nomoreplease 5y ago
      You’re claiming people are anti-vax without arguing against their arguments or data, saying they are concealing their intentions
MattGaiser 5y ago
What form do these mandates take? What kind of proof do they ask for? As I thought that vaccine information was private medical information. Couldn’t someone presumably just lie?
- TulliusCicero 5y ago
  It's private information by default, but here it's relevant for employment. You can refuse to give the information, of course, but they can also refuse to employ you for that.
  - MattGaiser 5y ago
    But what prevents someone from just lying? How is this not just an honour system thing?
    - TulliusCicero 5y ago
      I think you could present medical records, same as how it works currently for public school vaccination mandates. It's weird how many people are acting like this is some bizarre, novel thing. We've had mandatory vaccines for public schooling for decades now. Vaccines are also commonly required for some types of visas/immigration. Requiring vaccination in the interest of public health is not new.
- Covzire 5y ago
  IANAL, but the precedents set by all the battles that were fought in previous decades over diseases likes AIDS/HIV seem to make it very hazardous for employers to demand medical records. Liberals once fought hard to keep medical records out of employers hands, and won overwhelmingly, so I don't see how Google or any employer can actually enforce this without serious risk of a class action lawsuit.
hereforphone 5y ago
I am saying this as someone who has both shots and generally supports the vaccination. From what I understand Google is known as a company with a "liberal" culture. Is demanding employees accept one side of an argument and adhere to it (or face the consequences) contrary to the definition of "liberal"? That's the problem with Western politics. Liberal vs. conservative is no longer about how permissive we are with ideas and unpopular opinions. It's about what subset of ideas we accept.
- tome 5y ago
  In the US, "liberal" means left-leaning (compared to the US average).
- BHSPitMonkey 5y ago
  This policy has nothing to do with opinions and political leanings; it's a physical safety policy for an office. Most offices would also deny you access if you try to get in and stab fellow employees with dirty needles you found by the bus stop. You could argue the merits of Google not allowing employees the option to permanently work from home, but as far as their offices are concerned this is a very sane requirement for entry given the hazards that currently exist.
  - hereforphone 5y ago
    Theoretically. If you had an office in Pennsylvania or Minnesota and employed a lot of people that were Amish or Muslim (respectively), and for whatever reason would not accept the shot, would you fire them or allow them to work from home?
    - rsynnott 5y ago
      > He said there will be "an exceptions process for those who cannot be vaccinated for medical or other protected reasons." Religion would be a protected reason, I assume. Incidentally, Islam allows vaccination.
  - 55555 5y ago
rolobio 5y ago
I'm shocked so many people on HN support this. The only way I know to prove someone received a vaccine is for them to turn over their medical history. What if companies start refusing to hire someone because they have a bad medical history (insurance costs anyone)? I'm sure many people will respond to this saying "they don't need to turn over their full medical history!" but once we turn over a part of it, they will want the next part, and the next, its inevitable. There will always be a safety and security justification. And what of remote workers? A fully remote employee exposes zero company employees to risk. But they will be mandated to have a vaccine? Why must we always lose one more right each day? Edit: Apparently you receive proof of vaccination for the current COVID vaccines in the US. But isn't that still sharing part of your medical history? I have never once been asked a single question about my medical history during a job interview.
- PragmaticPulp 5y ago
  > The only way I know to prove someone received a vaccine is for them to turn over their medical history. What if companies start refusing to hire someone because they have a bad medical history (insurance costs anyone)? When you're vaccinated, you receive a small official card with the vaccination details. In the United States, the vaccines are free. This has nothing to do with your general medical history or medical records.
  - rolobio 5y ago
    Well thanks for the downvote. But isn't that card part of your medical history? What if they need proof you are vaccinated against measles? After all, its a proven vaccine...
    - BHSPitMonkey 5y ago
      > But isn't that card part of your medical history? It's the narrowest, most specific data point possible to establish that you won't put other innocent people in the building at risk of a new outbreak. > What if they do other things after this thing? What if dogs had antlers? What if sidewalks were made of cheese?
romesmoke 5y ago
Reminds me of a David Graeber article on the violence of bureaucracy. It was the first time in my life that I was convinced of the existence of such invisible threads of brutality. As then, it's also now very hard for me to remain non-biased: how can ultimatums demanding mass conformity be the only way for such a technically advanced civilization to 'be productive'? What are the serious counterarguments against the idea that even today, huge effort is invested in the subtle yet solid control of the individual?
benmw333 5y ago
Government forces you to pay for the vaccine and then forces the company you work for to take it or lose your job. Liberty is long gone in America. Nothing chaps my ass more than hearing and seeing the "vaccines are free" propaganda. Not to mention the billions government has spent in marketing and advertising on this vaccine. When was the last time government spent trillions to save 600,000 lives?
- TheHypnotist 5y ago
  Nothing you said makes sense or is based on reality, particularly the inane last line of your comment.
  - benmw333 5y ago
    What is: government handing billions of us dollars to moderna, pfizer and janssen
    - TheHypnotist 5y ago
      Did you pay out of pocket for the vaccine? Also, trillions to save 600,000 lives? What does that even mean?
      - benmw333 5y ago
        We are every day. Money supply - hello? Earth to major tom?
endisneigh 5y ago
How are they going to even know you took the vaccine? Honor system? If they force you to disclose doesn't that break HIPAA? If it doesn't break HIPAA, then doesn't this create a precedent that employers can gain your medical history with arbitrary mandates? Seems like a lose-lose.
- mtoner23 5y ago
  Hippa only applies to medical professionals i believe. Employers can always ask for your medical records. This has always been the case.
  - endisneigh 5y ago
    really? huh, TIL.
  - conductr 5y ago
    Extremely false. Hippa applies to all and is meant to protect people from discrimination on health matters. These policies will end up in court eventually and companies will argue the law moves too slowly for the concerns of the day and they had to make a decision they felt was best for safety of their employees.
    - TulliusCicero 5y ago
      This is incorrect. HIPPA prevents sharing info without consent. If you choose to give the info to your employer, HIPPA doesn't apply.
      - conductr 5y ago
        Well of course you do get to choose to waive your rights to hippa protections, you can waive any right you want. But you do not have to give your records and they aren’t allowed to obtain them without your consent. They’re also not allowed to “punish” you for failing to provide your health records. In this context, someone in the office may get promoted and someone WFH may think they deserved it. So they’ll sue on grounds that vaccinated people in the office are receiving advantage. Not saying it’s right or wrong but prior to covid this type of thing was an HR/legal nightmare any company would steer clear of.
roamerz 5y ago
The fact that these mandates ignore the fact that past infection also provides immunity is frustrating and makes me question what is behind the mandates themselves. A valid test showing the antibodies should be allowed in place of an immunization. https://www.nih.gov/news-events/nih-research-matters/lasting-immunity-found-after-recovery-covid-19 https://www.nih.gov/news-events/nih-research-matters/lasting...
- tantalor 5y ago
  Same reason why folks who got chicken pox as kids don't need the vaccine; we already had it! Edit: If you did have chickenpox, CDC says you don't need the vaccine. > CDC recommends two doses of chickenpox vaccine for children, adolescents, and adults who have never had chickenpox and were never vaccinated. https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/vpd/varicella/public/index.html https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/vpd/varicella/public/index.html
  - tablespoon 5y ago
    > Same reason why folks who got chicken pox as kids don't need the vaccine; we already had it! Chicken pox is a different disease. It's not the same as COVID-19. There are a lot of questions around natural COVID-19 immunity that people who want to rely on it need to answer if they don't want to get vaccinated (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27987103 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27987103). Then there's the question of why go through so much trouble to avoid something that's easy, cheap, and far more certain.
    - TigeriusKirk 5y ago
      The burden of proof is not on the people who have every reason to believe they have natural immunity. It's entirely on people who want to mandate a medical procedure.
      - tablespoon 5y ago
        > The burden of proof is not on the people who have every reason to believe they have natural immunity. > It's entirely on people who want to mandate a medical procedure. Nope, not really. While there is quite a high burden of proof on the people who want to mandate a medical procedure, the people who make their own medical claims (such as natural immunity provides equivalent or adequate protection) bear a significant burden of proof as well. Relieving them of that burden is completely impractical, since it would privilege all kinds of spurious claims. The vaccines have proven to be safe and effective. If you want another preventative treatment to be considered equivalent, prove it.
dukeofdoom 5y ago
I would trust google to know about their monster. "Google and the USAID-funded Wuhan scientist Peter Daszak’s virus experiments for over a decade"
Digory 5y ago
I suspect the standard will be to say "everyone must," with a long list of exceptions. And the truly vaccine-adverse will find their way into an exception. So the "mandates" moves the needle 10 or 15 percent, not the last 40 or 50%. I'm fully-Pfizered, but I think heavy-handed blanket rules without exceptions would cause more harm than good. People in Idaho shouldn't have the same blanket rule as Google HQ, and I bet the small number of true religious objectors at Google HQ would have no real impact on the public health math.
Panther34543 5y ago
Ugg, why doesn't anybody, whether it be government officials, employers, whatever, ever consider those with natural immunity? It's like some weird joke. The official CDC estimates over 115 MILLION natural infections in the U.S. alone, and that only accounts for February 2020-March 2021. It doesn't account for all the infections before February 2020 (I and most of my coworkers in downtown SF got it in January) nor any of the infections of the last 4 months, so that number should probably be at 130-140 million or more. Yet, for some unknown reason, natural infection is NEVER talked about anywhere. Why? There's an absolute ton of natural immunity that isn't being talked about or considered and it's very, very, strange. Many people have no intention of taking the vaccine because they prefer natural immunity.
- calvano915 5y ago
  Individual preferences need not apply. The "smarter" mob demands you remove your mask and ignore acquired immunity and instead submit to experimental vaccines because they'll feel better about it.
- _djo_ 5y ago
  Natural immunity is not as well understood as vaccine response and longevity for COVID-19. There's also increasing evidence that newer variants like Delta present a significant reinfection risk for those who were infected with the wildtype or even Alpha six or more months before.
  - leereeves 5y ago
    Delta also presents a risk of breakthrough infection for vaccinated people. And that seems likely to lead to the development of new strains against which the current vaccines are ineffective, as the virus mutates in vaccinated people. I'm vaccinated myself, but I don't count on that providing protection for long. I expect it to be more like the flu, for which yearly vaccines are required against whatever strains are expected to be common that year.
    - _djo_ 5y ago
amrcnimgrnt 5y ago
I don't mean this polemically, or rhetorically. I'm honestly asking because I've given this some thought, and it's not entirely obvious to me. "Who are the unvaccinated hurting, exactly?" It appears to me that a pandemic of the unvaccinated harms the unvaccinated. "Those who cant get the vaccines" Now, some people will point out that some can't get the vaccines. Except that ppl with HIV, GBS, autoimmune etc are all encouraged by the CDC to get the vaccine. Children under 12 have ridiculous low rates of harm from COVID. So the folks getting hurt by not being vaccinated are the ones who chose to be unvaccinated. (I have a fairly serious auto-immune disease and it's not obvious to me that I should get the vaccine. Some of the reported side-effects are triggering my auto-immune disease. I'm waiting for my annual appointment my specialist next month to talk about this) "Herd immunity to end the pandemic" Another objection is that the pandemic will not end, we will not reach herd immunity, unless we vaccinate x amount of people. Except that it's not obvious to me that pandemic will ever end - we'll just co-evolve with COVID to be less harmful. The reasons being: 1. We'll never vaccinate Afghanistan or Central Asia in general, South Saharan Africa, etc. so COVID will never go extinct [1] 2. COVID-19, being a coronavirus, will likely evolve quickly out of our vaccines' scope. Furthermore, variants bifurcate so even if we can make new vaccines quickly, there will be too many variants to have to target. 3. Given points 1. and 2., heard immunity for a given country appears to be futile attempt. 4. Quickly vaccinating everyone before COVID bifurcates too much appears to be a fools errand. Anyway, you'd make more progress vaccinating the third world than trying to convince reluctant young people in the first world. In the third world the vaccines would be far more effective at stopping COVID's bifurcation (since they have a lot of young people who could safely be inoculated by getting the virus itself by removing all COVID restrictions) [1] Not a dig at those countries, but a statement of fact based on the mistrust the central asians have since rich countries highjacked UN vaccination programs to advance their geo-political goals. Or poor quality vaccines/equipment that spread diseases amongst Africans. [EDIT] While I am not vaccinated, I did sign up for a vaccine trial and was rejected. So please, try not to make this personal.
- tablespoon 5y ago
  > "Who are the unvaccinated hurting, exactly?" My kids, who are too young to be vaccinated. I don't appreciate you being blase about their health. My father, who is quite possibly immunocompromised, and may not have acquired a strong immunity from his vaccine.
nezt0 5y ago
As others have pointed out, the long term side effects of this vaccine could take years to fully be known. To make matters worse, it's not a traditional exogenous antigen vaccine -- it's literally synthetic biology... an entirely man made RNA sequence. The idea that the long term side effects of a therapeutic that uses genetic engineer at this level are known is absolutely laughable. They are just setting the precedent for future mandated gene therapy injections (which will grow more complex, and are essentially little biological computer programs). The future is here folks. We live in a science fiction movie. I expect full blown societal collapse soon if the totalitarian take over plan doesn't work. Maybe folks should have listened to Peter Thiel in 2019 when he called Google treasonous.
version_five 5y ago
It saddens me to see that all the top comments on these posts are just some empty populist yelling, variations on "good, after all, there's a war going on". And counterpoints end up being strawmen about vaccines not working anyway. Whatever your end conclusion about whether this is a good move, it's a complex issue that balances a lot of things and is worthy of serious discussion. Instead we get basically an online newspaper comments section filled with shallow or nonexistent points. It's like covid turns everyone toward the lowest forms of debate. HN probably had the most sensible discussions of any site on the internet, so if this is happening here, I can only guess how others are discussing it. I do wonder if tech people are more prone to seeing things in black and white and advocating technological "fixes" over societal compromises, but that's just my speculation.
- TulliusCicero 5y ago
  It's not actually very complex, and in fact for public schools was already a settled issue. It's only become controversial because of rising anti-vaxx sentiment and conspiratorial thinking. Just because something has become a flashpoint issue doesn't mean it's complex. Gay marriage was also controversial for a long time, despite being quite straightforward.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - Fine-Cut4983 5y ago
    How did almost every human in all sorts of varying societies fail to understand something quite straightforward for almost the entire duration of human existence?
  - azth 5y ago
    Homosexual marriage is not straight forward: https://www.kirkdurston.com/blog/unwin https://www.kirkdurston.com/blog/unwin
- astura 5y ago
  >Whatever your end conclusion about whether this is a good move, it's a complex issue that balances a lot of things and is worthy of serious discussion. Ok, so why don't you start the "serious discussion" instead of just complaining? What exactly "complex" about it? All 50 states, DC, and Puerto Rico have immunization requirements for enrollment in public schools and many private schools and daycares have similar requirements. On the federal level the military has all sorts of immunization requirements and USCIS have immunization requirements for visa/green card applicants. As a result the vast majority of adults are vaccinated against a whole host of infectious diseases so companies don't usually find it urgent to implement their own policies - vaccine preventable illnesses simply aren't an issue in American offices. We, as a society, have overwhelmingly accepted immunization requirements as a general concept - there's not really much to discuss.
dukeofdoom 5y ago
Well, already job offers: "If you work at Google or Facebook and don't want to get the mandatory vax you can always come and work for Gab. At Gab we respect your medical privacy and do not require an experimental non-FDA approved vaccine that doesn't stop you from getting Covid and includes other high risk side effects including death." Andrew Torba
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

162 points by nevir 5y ago

Whatarethese 5y ago

Good. Its time to stop messing around with this. The vaccines are tested and are safe.

psalminen 5y ago
My only issue is with this line: >> employees could continue working from home through Oct. 18. I agree that they should mandate vaccines for in office. But if they do so, I don't think they should force people into the office.
- alistairSH 5y ago
  If Google believes their employees are more productive in the office, why shouldn't they do everything in their power to get the workforce back into the office?
  - oceliker 5y ago
    Productivity is (hopefully) not the only metric — employee happiness is important too.
    - smueller1234 5y ago
      And survival.
      - alistairSH 5y ago
        Thus the vaccination requirement. I don't agree with Google on returning to the office (at all, irrespective of COVID), but frankly at this point, almost anything that improves vaccine rates is fine with me. The sooner we're all vaccinated, the sooner we can return to normal life.
        thisiscorrect 5y ago
        That may not be how things play out. Vaccination may facilitate immune escape[1] "Given that therapeutics (vaccines and antibody-based therapies) target mainly the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein, the selection pressures that favour the emergence of new variants carrying immune escape mutations generated in chronic infections24,25,26 will be similar to those selecting for mutations that allow reinfections within the wider population27,28,29. Therefore, sequencing of viruses associated with prolonged infections will provide useful information on mutations that could contribute to increased transmissibility or escape from vaccine-mediated immunity." [1] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41579-021-00573-0 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41579-021-00573-0
        alistairSH 5y ago
        Wouldn't that more likely apply in the case where we have significant vaccination rates, but NOT yet at the level of herd immunity? IE, if we're vaccinated to the point of herd immunity, this ceases to be a problem? To be otherwise would tend to imply smallpox and other vaccines should already have evolved, no?
        thisiscorrect 5y ago
        I think you mean "smallpox and other viruses should already have evolved." The difference is that the smallpox vaccine prevented infection of the vaccinated. That's not the case for existing SARS-CoV-2 vaccines. https://www.verywellhealth.com/covid-19-vaccines-and-sterilizing-immunity-5092148 https://www.verywellhealth.com/covid-19-vaccines-and-sterili... gives an approachable overview of the difference. Smallpox was eradicated. The likelihood of the same happening to SARS-CoV-2 is lower. At least, it would be the first example of a respiratory infection being eliminated. Influenza hasn't been eradicated and it does continue to evolve. More broadly, the idea of "immune escape" is hardly something I can lay claim to. You can read about it in existing literature.
  - mupuff1234 5y ago
    Only if you think the "productivity" metric trumps everything else.
- heavenlyblue 5y ago
  > But if they do so, I don't think they should force people into the office. They could just fire them otherwise?
- tfehring 5y ago
  "Mandate" means something very different when performed by a private employer than by a government entity. In the former case it means something like "make continued employment conditional upon." Google employees are perfectly free to decide they're no longer satisfied with the conditions of their employment and find new jobs elsewhere instead. Edited to add: In terms of whether Google "should" do so, I assume they've thought through the trade-off of increased attrition vs. reduced risk of COVID outbreaks (among other factors) and decided that allowing unvaccinated people to either go back to the office or work remotely would be a net negative for the company.
  - sharken 5y ago
    I thought Google was better than this, guess not.
  - kyruzic 5y ago
    Do you really believe Google is ready to lose at least 20% of their staff? That would be a horrible decision especially in the market we are currently in. These people will easily find jobs elsewhere.
    - tfehring 5y ago
      I doubt Google will lose anywhere close to 20% of its staff, and I assume Google doubts that too. I expect the rest of FAANG+ will follow suit, and there won't be that many jobs where you can earn a FAANG-level salary without being vaccinated (either because they're fully remote or otherwise). When push comes to shove I don't think that many people will be willing to take six-figure pay cuts.
- UncleMeat 5y ago
  Google has set up a bunch of alternative options ranging from permanent remote work to temporary extensions of up to a year. If people don't feel comfortable coming back on the date, it isn't hard to stay at home longer.
symlinkk 5y ago
They aren’t fully tested, they have emergency FDA approval but haven’t finished the standard approval process yet.
- bastardoperator 5y ago
  They are fully tested with continued scrutiny. They have been given emergency approval and granted priority review. There is quantifiable fact and evidence that these vaccines are very effective and safe. Both of the mRNA vaccines are scheduled for full approval in Jan/Feb of 2022.
  - kyruzic 5y ago
    This is a lie. There is still testing going on to confirm their safety and effectiveness. Here is a list of them: https://www.pfizer.com/science/find-a-trial/search/BNT162b2/?distance=1000&items_per_page=10 https://www.pfizer.com/science/find-a-trial/search/BNT162b2/...
    - bastardoperator 5y ago
      "continued scrutiny"... In terms of efficacy and safety, the facts are undeniable. No medication is perfect. If you've ever seen an advertisement for medicine, many of them come without side effects that outweigh the risk of not taking the medication. Depending on where you live, I'd look to the government, versus Pfizer's website for clinical trial details: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/results/details?cond=covid https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/results/details?cond=covid
hanoz 5y ago
They are not tested long term.
- veemjeem 5y ago
  Are there any vaccines in history that have caused something unexpected 10 years from injection?
  - astura 5y ago
    No. https://www.muhealth.org/our-stories/how-do-we-know-covid-19-vaccine-wont-have-long-term-side-effects https://www.muhealth.org/our-stories/how-do-we-know-covid-19... >When new vaccines are released, the unknown side effects, if any, show up within two months of vaccination. This history goes back to at least the 1960s with the oral polio vaccine and examples continue through today. Beyond that you have to look at this in context - the probability of being harmed by COVID-19 vaccine (including long term) vs the probability of being harmed by a COVID-19 infection (including long term). The vaccine have the lower probability of harm by a very large magnitude.
  - nevir 5y ago
    Have we had any other mRNA based vaccines in the past? (genuinely curious)
    - aaomidi 5y ago
      There are vaccines you can get that aren't mRNA based.
      - endisneigh 5y ago
        I'm genuinely curious if you could sue Google if you got J&J because of their mandate and you happened to be one of the extremely rare folks who got a blood clot from it.
        pb7 5y ago
criddell 5y ago
Why are the major COVID-19 vaccines still under FDA emergency use authorization guidelines? What's preventing the FDA from dropping those special rules and treating the vaccine like every other vaccine?
- pb7 5y ago
  Because full authorization takes time. The speed in rolling out emergency use vaccination was by the book. Speeding up full authorization would not be.
  - lancemurdock 5y ago
    interesting precedent for the future. Whats an 'emergency'? Whats is the point of an FDA review at this point?
    - pb7 5y ago
      When the cost of not taking action (not vaccinating) exceeds the cost of taking action (vaccinating).
      - lancemurdock 5y ago
        thats an incredibly loose definition and up for manipulation
        roberttod 5y ago
        The FDA decides what counts as an emergency, and if they wanted to manipulate the approval process then that would be the least of our problems. Further, if we can't react to a pandemic which could be even quicker spreading and more deadly than covid because we're unable to lower the risk tolerance for a cure/vaccine then that seems to be complete against any common sense.
        lancemurdock 5y ago
jakebasile 5y ago
I too think it's great when an employer with all the power forces employees to submit to medical procedures against their will in order to continue earning a living. My body my choice, right? Wow, I've never gotten a comment flagged in my years of being here, let alone within minutes! Good to see this a fruitful unbiased discussion forum.
- aaomidi 5y ago
  This is what happens when you fetishize corporatism and jail and silence people who have been critical of capitalism. Would people be up to seize the means of production now? Or would we still keep arguing that companies can do whatever they want?
  - BHSPitMonkey 5y ago
    If all of Google's intelligent employees were to rise up and seize control of the company today, they would enact the same office vaccination requirement that Sundar is announcing here.
    - aaomidi 5y ago
      Probably, but it would be a communal requirement rather than a top-down requirement.
      - UncleMeat 5y ago
        I'm pretty confident that AWU supports this policy.
        aaomidi 5y ago
        There was a misunderstanding here, I'm also for the vaccine requirement. However, I am also questioning "what can an employer mandate?" There's something to be said about where the enforcement is coming from and how it's being applied.
      - 5y ago
neither_color 5y ago
I'm vaccinated and I personally don't care if others choose not to do it.
- orhmeh09 5y ago
  Why? Aren’t you worried that a patchily vaccinated population still provides a good (possibly even better) breeding ground for new variants?
  - native_samples 5y ago
    I'm not. This argument is not reasonable and looks suspiciously like working backwards from a desired outcome to something that sounds like a scientific justification. Firstly, the vaccines seem "effective" against variants, using the current definition of effectiveness of just reducing symptoms. Secondly, no vaccine in history has come with a disclaimer that it doesn't work unless 100% of the population is vaccinated. That's not the definition of what vaccines do. Vaccines give individual protection. If these vaccines had been advertised as requiring that, would they have been approved? It is hard to see how because believing this raises fundamental questions, questions like: given that people cannot all be vaccinated simultaneously, how quickly is it required to get to 100% vaccination before the vaccine becomes useless? This variable would seem to be critical for any such "vaccine" yet no such time dimension is available, probably because no study would have ever been created to try and discover that - because there's no scientific basis for determining it. Thirdly, governments were saying very clearly that estimates of herd immunity were in the 60-70% range - very far from everyone. Why are people now claiming that this was wrong? On what basis? And if it was wrong, why should anyone believe any claims about vaccines at all?
    - pseudalopex 5y ago
      > Firstly, the vaccines seem "effective" against variants, using the current definition of effectiveness of just reducing symptoms. Effectiveness against current variants doesn't guarantee effectiveness against future variants. "Just" reducing symptoms keeps people out of hospitals and graves. > Secondly, no vaccine in history has come with a disclaimer that it doesn't work unless 100% of the population is vaccinated. Straw man. > Vaccines give individual protection. And herd immunity when enough people get them. > Thirdly, governments were saying very clearly that estimates of herd immunity were in the 60-70% range - very far from everyone. Why are people now claiming that this was wrong? I very clearly heard up to 90% of the population. And we wouldn't know until people got vaccinated. Governments then set lower targets like 70% of adults. Probably they decided they couldn't persuade 90% of the population. Those weren't herd immunity estimates though. Some estimates have gone up because the delta variant is more transmissible. Moreover most countries are under 60% vaccinated.
hereforphone 5y ago
I have taken both shots. But I wouldn't call them "safe", as they are young and approved under emergency guidelines. They are probably safe, but nobody knows that right now.
- giarc 5y ago
  There's been nearly 4 billion shots delivered across the world in the past 8 months. I suspect if they were to cause great harm, we would have known by now.
  - freedomben 5y ago
    Some vaccines take years or even decades to show harm. See Air Force pilots and Anthrax vaccine history. Rare but devastating consequences. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with the covid vax. I got Pfizer myself as soon as it was available. But there is still room for doubt.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - giarc 5y ago
      Sure, but the harm from COVID is pretty evident in the 600,000 deaths in the states in the past 18 months. No one has said the vaccine is 100% safe, it does list side effects after all, but this whole notion of "I'm waiting until all the data is out/it's only approved for emergency use" is just nonsensical.
      - bruceb 5y ago
        If you are young and in shape, then the likely hood of you dying is extremely low.
        pb7 5y ago
        Except if there are severe consequences that will only arise years down the line, which we're already seeing, right?
h_anna_h 5y ago
Do they actually reduce spread or do they instead just make people who catch it more likely to avoid hospitalization and increase their survival chances? If it is the first I can see why they do it, if it is the second then I do not see the point of enforcing it. Although I wonder if they will consider workers who passed covid before (and thus have antibodies) as "vaccinated". > The vaccines are tested and are safe Weren't there various (rare) occurrences of serious side effects? (such as the blood clot thing for astra and jonson or myocarditis for pfizer and moderna)
- majormajor 5y ago
  From the data I've seen, they are potentially looking more effective at preventing cases than at preventing hospitalization: https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-07-22/los-angeles-covid-june-vaccine-breakthrough-cases https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-07-22/los-ange... > Among fully vaccinated people, there were about 27 coronavirus infections for every 100,000 county residents in June, according to figures presented Thursday. But among people not fully vaccinated, there were 125 infections for every 100,000 residents. > That month, there were also 2 fully vaccinated people hospitalized for every 100,000 residents — much smaller than the comparable rate, 11, for people not fully vaccinated. So per 100k fully vaccinated people, 27 cases and 2 hospitalizations. Or: 7.4% of cases resulting in hospitalization. Per 100k not-fully-vaccinated: 125 cases and 11 hospitalizations. Or: 8.8% of cases resulting in hospitalization. What this doesn't tell us is "how many cases were so mild and occurred in people who aren't getting test regularly that they went under the radar." I don't know of any data telling us anything about what the "mild case rate" looks like for vaccinated vs unvaccinated (it would be VERY hard to measure without widespread mandatory testing). But if you've got a case that gets detected, the vaccine doesn't really seem to prevent that case from hospitalizing you at the same rate as before. It just prevents you from getting those cases nearly as frequently as the rest of the population.
  - cowl 5y ago
    UK statstics show a 20 factor reduction in hospitalisation rates for vaccinated people vs non vaccinated. However what is not considered in all these statistics is the non-symtomatic cases. If hospitalisation rate is 20 times lower it means also that symtomatic infections are way lower than those detected. In your cited statistics for those 27 cases there would be a lot more not diagnosed at all. The risk here is that although they will pass it without notice they will also risk infecting others-hence the recomandation that vaccinated people still need to use masks. There is a great risk on falling into complancy here if we think vaccination is the silver bullet and is enough.
bwship 5y ago
Didn't Billy Joel sing: "Lebanon, Charles de Gaulle California baseball Starkweather Homicide Children of Covid-19 Vaccine"
sharken 5y ago
The problem is not the vaccine by itself, it is that you no longer have a say in what happens with your body. I guess switching jobs is the only cure for this unfortunate trend.
- bradstewart 5y ago
  I don't understand this argument. This isn't the first time vaccines have been required. For instance, every state has required vaccines for school attendance--from kindergarten through college. Here's the list for Texas: https://dshs.texas.gov/immunize/school/school-requirements.aspx https://dshs.texas.gov/immunize/school/school-requirements.a... Are you opposed to those mandates as well, or is this one different?
  - calvano915 5y ago
    Vaccines that are under EUA status?
  - sharken 5y ago
    This one is different. In my country in 2018, deaths caused by the flu was more than 50% of all registered Corona deaths. Just that season alone. Now some wants to mandate Corona vaccines, but then what about flu vaccines ?
    - bradstewart 5y ago
      Understood. I rarely get a straight answer to that question from people who make the "it's my body" argument, so I appreciate the reply.
    - pseudalopex 5y ago
      Did your country restrict or mandate anything to prevent COVID-19 spreading?
      - MatteoFrigo 5y ago
        I don't know about GP's country, but http://euromomo.eu/ http://euromomo.eu/ has a lot of data whereby one can answer such questions for multiple countries in Europe.
cbradford 5y ago
That is a statement of opinion, not a fact. It is misinformation statements like this that need to be stamped out in social media.
- gilbetron 5y ago
  1.1 billion fully vaccinated, maybe a few dozen deaths can be contributed. 200 million reported covid cases, if we go with typical estimates of 2-5X unreported, then we get to a similar number of just over a billion infected, with 4.2 million deaths, not to mention all the nasty "long covid" (hate the expression, btw) cases that are probably higher than that. Those are facts. You can say, without evidence, that the vaccines will cause your head to explode in 10 years, but I can say the same thing about Covid infections.
jackTheMan 5y ago
I hope people who don't take vaccine also ignore bio-engineered food. Wait it's not labeled in the US. So much about being scared of long term effect...
TKWasRight 5y ago
No they aren't. We don't have long term data so what you said cannot be proven or said to be accurate.

rootusrootus 5y ago

Where Google goes, I expect the rest of the tech companies (including companies that just fancy themselves as tech companies) to follow. This is that moment when everyone is reminded of "at will" employment.

peder 5y ago
Tech companies won't move in lockstep on this. Battle for talent is too intense, not many companies can call shots like this like Google can. Some companies will be glad to differentiate to try and attract Googlers that do not want to return to the office, that do not want to be vaccinated (tho I think the number of tech workers that are not vax'd is small)
- giarc 5y ago
  I agree, I suspect that very few Googlers will be unvaxxed and that trying to identify these individuals and poach them will be tough. Not a good look if other tech companies are specifically bringing in non-vaccinated employees. Might create issues with current employees.
  - xxxtentachyon 5y ago
    Yeah, and on the demand side, I have a hunch that a company that implicitly or explicitly uses their lack of a vaccine requirement as a recruiting pitch would have a hard time recruiting a large subset of engineers.
    - giarc 5y ago
      The venn diagram of unvaxxed, exceptional engineers, willing to move to a new company is probably very, very small.
      - Trasmatta 5y ago
        With the amount of ridiculous anti-vaxxing statements in this thread, I'm beginning to think there may actually be a large contingent of software engineers deciding not to be vaccinated.

astura 5y ago

You will see a lot more of this in the coming days. A lot of non-medical companies/organizations were waiting for full FDA approval before requiring vaccines to make doubly sure they are following the law. The Justice Department posted an opinion yesterday saying it's legal to require vaccinations that are approved under EUA. https://www.cnn.com/2021/07/26/politics/doj-covid-19-vaccine-requirements-olc-opinion/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2021/07/26/politics/doj-covid-19-vaccine... California State University responded by requiring students to get COVID-19 vaccines even if they are only approved under EUA, previously they had said their policy was to require them when FDA gave full approval. https://www2.calstate.edu/csu-system/news/Pages/California-State-University-to-Implement-COVID-19-Vaccination-Requirement-for-Fall-2021-Term.aspx https://www2.calstate.edu/csu-system/news/Pages/California-S... Biden said that he expects full approval as early as late August. It's already been three months since Pfizer submitted their application for full approval, two since Moderna did.

Kenji 5y ago

They will lose a lot of smart people like this.

PragmaticPulp 5y ago

Looks like employees have until October 18th to be vaccinated and return to the office.: > Google announced Wednesday it would require all in-office workers and visitors to be vaccinated and that employees could continue working from home through Oct. 18. It's possible, perhaps even likely, that the vaccines will be fully FDA approved before that date (Source: FDA spokesperson speaking here https://www.cnn.com/2021/07/16/health/pfizer-covid-19-vaccine-fda-priority-review/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2021/07/16/health/pfizer-covid-19-vaccin... ) It should go without saying that they're obviously aware that some rare medical circumstances may not allow the vaccine. They have prepared an exceptions process for those people: > He said there will be "an exceptions process for those who cannot be vaccinated for medical or other protected reasons.

halfjoking 5y ago

All WHO approved vaccines? I'm thinking of leaving the country to try to get an inactive virus vaccine. I don't let anyone else run RNA code in my cells. The attack surface is too large.

papaf 5y ago
I don't let anyone else run RNA code in my cells I think that happens every time you catch a cold.
- TheHypnotist 5y ago
  This is an example of the incredible ignorance around vaccines.
safog 5y ago
What exactly do you imagine will happen if your cells run someone else's RNA code? They already run someone else's RNA code when you get infected by any random virus.
- halfjoking 5y ago
  There are more types of RNA than just mRNA. https://www.livescience.com/25988-rna-versatile-molecules.html https://www.livescience.com/25988-rna-versatile-molecules.ht... I'm not an expert so I'm not going to speculate which type might be used, but the risk that the government is using (soon to be mandatory) shots as a way to insert a biological backdoor into the masses far outweighs the risk of catching covid again. They want backdoors into all software systems... why wouldn't they want a backdoor into your biology? If not now, then what about when we're on our 5th booster? If I was dying on my bed from some crazy variant that the government was fearmongering, I would still think that my risk assessment was valid. I'd have no regrets.
  - majormajor 5y ago
    You shouldn't be willing to have any shot if that's your perception of the threat level. Why create a back door when you're literally opening a front door through the shot? Who gives a shit if it claims to be mRNA or not in that scenario? Don't breathe unfiltered air either. Why not just distribute this backdoor as an aerosol?

azangru 5y ago

So if an employee develops one of the rare adverse events, will Google be liable for damages?

OgAstorga 5y ago
I don’t think so. Everyone is free to leave if the don’t like the new policies. It’s not like there is a tight market for highly skilled software engineers
- h_anna_h 5y ago
  This is a concerning argument. We have laws regarding labor for a reason. "I just decided to pay you below the minimum wage and not give you any days off" has not been considered acceptable for decades despite the employees being "free to leave if they do not like the new policies". Edit: I am arguing against the argument itself in general. Not specifically for the vaccine case.
  - summerlight 5y ago
    > "I just decided to pay you below the minimum wage and not give you any days off" That's a pure disadvantage against employees. Vaccine mandate is a bit different; it is about employee protection, especially for those subset who cannot get vaccines due to their health conditions.

bruceb 5y ago

The vaccines are safe and you will be fired for not taking it...also if something happens, you can't sue the vaccine makers.

tablespoon 5y ago
> ...also if something happens, you can't sue the vaccine makers. Because the liability has been centralized in a fund that will pay you damages: the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program. If "something happens," you'll still be compensated.
- dragonwriter 5y ago
  > Because the liability has been centralized in a fund that will pay you damages: the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program. Actually, the Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program (CICP is broadly similar to VICP, but instead of general recommended routine vaccines, covers recommended pandemic/epidemic/etc. diagnostic, treatment, and prevention measures, inclusing vaccines not covered by VICP.) https://www.hrsa.gov/cicp/faq#covid https://www.hrsa.gov/cicp/faq#covid

nrclark 5y ago

This might act like an employee filter as well, so maybe it's a win-win from Google's perspective. There's a very high correlation between anti-vaxxers and those who buy into The Big Lie. As a society, we don't need to humor or cater to these people. Google is an at-will employer, which means that employee or employer can terminate the arrangement at any time. Employees who like the gravy train and feel entitled to the perks can choose to keep them, or they can go somewhere else.

Trasmatta 5y ago

The amount of thinly veiled (or actually outright blatant) anti-vax posts here on Hacker News is really disheartening.

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romesmoke 5y ago
The amount of times people expressing mere skepticism (even here on Hacker News!) have been flagged as 'anti-vax' is also not that encouraging. Seeing tin foil hats everywhere is easy--and a trap.
endisneigh 5y ago
I'm curious, in your mind is someone who wants to be unvaccinated the same as anti-vax? Someone could be unvaccinated and not discourage the vaccinate and simultaneously not want the vaccination for themselves. Would that be an anti-vax position? full disclosure - I'm vaccinated with moderna.
nomoreplease 5y ago
Your comment is disheartening. Pretending there are absolutely zero side-effects to vaccines (or any medical practices) is anti-science
- Trasmatta 5y ago
  > Pretending there are absolutely zero side-effects to vaccines I honestly don't know how you got this from my post.
  - nomoreplease 5y ago
    You’re claiming people are anti-vax without arguing against their arguments or data, saying they are concealing their intentions

MattGaiser 5y ago

What form do these mandates take? What kind of proof do they ask for? As I thought that vaccine information was private medical information. Couldn’t someone presumably just lie?

TulliusCicero 5y ago
It's private information by default, but here it's relevant for employment. You can refuse to give the information, of course, but they can also refuse to employ you for that.
- MattGaiser 5y ago
  But what prevents someone from just lying? How is this not just an honour system thing?
  - TulliusCicero 5y ago
    I think you could present medical records, same as how it works currently for public school vaccination mandates. It's weird how many people are acting like this is some bizarre, novel thing. We've had mandatory vaccines for public schooling for decades now. Vaccines are also commonly required for some types of visas/immigration. Requiring vaccination in the interest of public health is not new.
Covzire 5y ago
IANAL, but the precedents set by all the battles that were fought in previous decades over diseases likes AIDS/HIV seem to make it very hazardous for employers to demand medical records. Liberals once fought hard to keep medical records out of employers hands, and won overwhelmingly, so I don't see how Google or any employer can actually enforce this without serious risk of a class action lawsuit.

hereforphone 5y ago

I am saying this as someone who has both shots and generally supports the vaccination. From what I understand Google is known as a company with a "liberal" culture. Is demanding employees accept one side of an argument and adhere to it (or face the consequences) contrary to the definition of "liberal"? That's the problem with Western politics. Liberal vs. conservative is no longer about how permissive we are with ideas and unpopular opinions. It's about what subset of ideas we accept.

tome 5y ago
In the US, "liberal" means left-leaning (compared to the US average).
BHSPitMonkey 5y ago
This policy has nothing to do with opinions and political leanings; it's a physical safety policy for an office. Most offices would also deny you access if you try to get in and stab fellow employees with dirty needles you found by the bus stop. You could argue the merits of Google not allowing employees the option to permanently work from home, but as far as their offices are concerned this is a very sane requirement for entry given the hazards that currently exist.
- hereforphone 5y ago
  Theoretically. If you had an office in Pennsylvania or Minnesota and employed a lot of people that were Amish or Muslim (respectively), and for whatever reason would not accept the shot, would you fire them or allow them to work from home?
  - rsynnott 5y ago
    > He said there will be "an exceptions process for those who cannot be vaccinated for medical or other protected reasons." Religion would be a protected reason, I assume. Incidentally, Islam allows vaccination.
- 55555 5y ago

rolobio 5y ago

I'm shocked so many people on HN support this. The only way I know to prove someone received a vaccine is for them to turn over their medical history. What if companies start refusing to hire someone because they have a bad medical history (insurance costs anyone)? I'm sure many people will respond to this saying "they don't need to turn over their full medical history!" but once we turn over a part of it, they will want the next part, and the next, its inevitable. There will always be a safety and security justification. And what of remote workers? A fully remote employee exposes zero company employees to risk. But they will be mandated to have a vaccine? Why must we always lose one more right each day? Edit: Apparently you receive proof of vaccination for the current COVID vaccines in the US. But isn't that still sharing part of your medical history? I have never once been asked a single question about my medical history during a job interview.

PragmaticPulp 5y ago
> The only way I know to prove someone received a vaccine is for them to turn over their medical history. What if companies start refusing to hire someone because they have a bad medical history (insurance costs anyone)? When you're vaccinated, you receive a small official card with the vaccination details. In the United States, the vaccines are free. This has nothing to do with your general medical history or medical records.
- rolobio 5y ago
  Well thanks for the downvote. But isn't that card part of your medical history? What if they need proof you are vaccinated against measles? After all, its a proven vaccine...
  - BHSPitMonkey 5y ago
    > But isn't that card part of your medical history? It's the narrowest, most specific data point possible to establish that you won't put other innocent people in the building at risk of a new outbreak. > What if they do other things after this thing? What if dogs had antlers? What if sidewalks were made of cheese?

romesmoke 5y ago

Reminds me of a David Graeber article on the violence of bureaucracy. It was the first time in my life that I was convinced of the existence of such invisible threads of brutality. As then, it's also now very hard for me to remain non-biased: how can ultimatums demanding mass conformity be the only way for such a technically advanced civilization to 'be productive'? What are the serious counterarguments against the idea that even today, huge effort is invested in the subtle yet solid control of the individual?

benmw333 5y ago

Government forces you to pay for the vaccine and then forces the company you work for to take it or lose your job. Liberty is long gone in America. Nothing chaps my ass more than hearing and seeing the "vaccines are free" propaganda. Not to mention the billions government has spent in marketing and advertising on this vaccine. When was the last time government spent trillions to save 600,000 lives?

TheHypnotist 5y ago
Nothing you said makes sense or is based on reality, particularly the inane last line of your comment.
- benmw333 5y ago
  What is: government handing billions of us dollars to moderna, pfizer and janssen
  - TheHypnotist 5y ago
    Did you pay out of pocket for the vaccine? Also, trillions to save 600,000 lives? What does that even mean?
    - benmw333 5y ago
      We are every day. Money supply - hello? Earth to major tom?

endisneigh 5y ago

How are they going to even know you took the vaccine? Honor system? If they force you to disclose doesn't that break HIPAA? If it doesn't break HIPAA, then doesn't this create a precedent that employers can gain your medical history with arbitrary mandates? Seems like a lose-lose.

mtoner23 5y ago
Hippa only applies to medical professionals i believe. Employers can always ask for your medical records. This has always been the case.
- endisneigh 5y ago
  really? huh, TIL.
- conductr 5y ago
  Extremely false. Hippa applies to all and is meant to protect people from discrimination on health matters. These policies will end up in court eventually and companies will argue the law moves too slowly for the concerns of the day and they had to make a decision they felt was best for safety of their employees.
  - TulliusCicero 5y ago
    This is incorrect. HIPPA prevents sharing info without consent. If you choose to give the info to your employer, HIPPA doesn't apply.
    - conductr 5y ago
      Well of course you do get to choose to waive your rights to hippa protections, you can waive any right you want. But you do not have to give your records and they aren’t allowed to obtain them without your consent. They’re also not allowed to “punish” you for failing to provide your health records. In this context, someone in the office may get promoted and someone WFH may think they deserved it. So they’ll sue on grounds that vaccinated people in the office are receiving advantage. Not saying it’s right or wrong but prior to covid this type of thing was an HR/legal nightmare any company would steer clear of.

roamerz 5y ago

The fact that these mandates ignore the fact that past infection also provides immunity is frustrating and makes me question what is behind the mandates themselves. A valid test showing the antibodies should be allowed in place of an immunization. https://www.nih.gov/news-events/nih-research-matters/lasting-immunity-found-after-recovery-covid-19 https://www.nih.gov/news-events/nih-research-matters/lasting...

tantalor 5y ago
Same reason why folks who got chicken pox as kids don't need the vaccine; we already had it! Edit: If you did have chickenpox, CDC says you don't need the vaccine. > CDC recommends two doses of chickenpox vaccine for children, adolescents, and adults who have never had chickenpox and were never vaccinated. https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/vpd/varicella/public/index.html https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/vpd/varicella/public/index.html
- tablespoon 5y ago
  > Same reason why folks who got chicken pox as kids don't need the vaccine; we already had it! Chicken pox is a different disease. It's not the same as COVID-19. There are a lot of questions around natural COVID-19 immunity that people who want to rely on it need to answer if they don't want to get vaccinated (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27987103 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27987103). Then there's the question of why go through so much trouble to avoid something that's easy, cheap, and far more certain.
  - TigeriusKirk 5y ago
    The burden of proof is not on the people who have every reason to believe they have natural immunity. It's entirely on people who want to mandate a medical procedure.
    - tablespoon 5y ago
      > The burden of proof is not on the people who have every reason to believe they have natural immunity. > It's entirely on people who want to mandate a medical procedure. Nope, not really. While there is quite a high burden of proof on the people who want to mandate a medical procedure, the people who make their own medical claims (such as natural immunity provides equivalent or adequate protection) bear a significant burden of proof as well. Relieving them of that burden is completely impractical, since it would privilege all kinds of spurious claims. The vaccines have proven to be safe and effective. If you want another preventative treatment to be considered equivalent, prove it.

dukeofdoom 5y ago

I would trust google to know about their monster. "Google and the USAID-funded Wuhan scientist Peter Daszak’s virus experiments for over a decade"

Digory 5y ago

I suspect the standard will be to say "everyone must," with a long list of exceptions. And the truly vaccine-adverse will find their way into an exception. So the "mandates" moves the needle 10 or 15 percent, not the last 40 or 50%. I'm fully-Pfizered, but I think heavy-handed blanket rules without exceptions would cause more harm than good. People in Idaho shouldn't have the same blanket rule as Google HQ, and I bet the small number of true religious objectors at Google HQ would have no real impact on the public health math.

Panther34543 5y ago

Ugg, why doesn't anybody, whether it be government officials, employers, whatever, ever consider those with natural immunity? It's like some weird joke. The official CDC estimates over 115 MILLION natural infections in the U.S. alone, and that only accounts for February 2020-March 2021. It doesn't account for all the infections before February 2020 (I and most of my coworkers in downtown SF got it in January) nor any of the infections of the last 4 months, so that number should probably be at 130-140 million or more. Yet, for some unknown reason, natural infection is NEVER talked about anywhere. Why? There's an absolute ton of natural immunity that isn't being talked about or considered and it's very, very, strange. Many people have no intention of taking the vaccine because they prefer natural immunity.

calvano915 5y ago
Individual preferences need not apply. The "smarter" mob demands you remove your mask and ignore acquired immunity and instead submit to experimental vaccines because they'll feel better about it.
_djo_ 5y ago
Natural immunity is not as well understood as vaccine response and longevity for COVID-19. There's also increasing evidence that newer variants like Delta present a significant reinfection risk for those who were infected with the wildtype or even Alpha six or more months before.
- leereeves 5y ago
  Delta also presents a risk of breakthrough infection for vaccinated people. And that seems likely to lead to the development of new strains against which the current vaccines are ineffective, as the virus mutates in vaccinated people. I'm vaccinated myself, but I don't count on that providing protection for long. I expect it to be more like the flu, for which yearly vaccines are required against whatever strains are expected to be common that year.
  - _djo_ 5y ago

amrcnimgrnt 5y ago

I don't mean this polemically, or rhetorically. I'm honestly asking because I've given this some thought, and it's not entirely obvious to me. "Who are the unvaccinated hurting, exactly?" It appears to me that a pandemic of the unvaccinated harms the unvaccinated. "Those who cant get the vaccines" Now, some people will point out that some can't get the vaccines. Except that ppl with HIV, GBS, autoimmune etc are all encouraged by the CDC to get the vaccine. Children under 12 have ridiculous low rates of harm from COVID. So the folks getting hurt by not being vaccinated are the ones who chose to be unvaccinated. (I have a fairly serious auto-immune disease and it's not obvious to me that I should get the vaccine. Some of the reported side-effects are triggering my auto-immune disease. I'm waiting for my annual appointment my specialist next month to talk about this) "Herd immunity to end the pandemic" Another objection is that the pandemic will not end, we will not reach herd immunity, unless we vaccinate x amount of people. Except that it's not obvious to me that pandemic will ever end - we'll just co-evolve with COVID to be less harmful. The reasons being: 1. We'll never vaccinate Afghanistan or Central Asia in general, South Saharan Africa, etc. so COVID will never go extinct [1] 2. COVID-19, being a coronavirus, will likely evolve quickly out of our vaccines' scope. Furthermore, variants bifurcate so even if we can make new vaccines quickly, there will be too many variants to have to target. 3. Given points 1. and 2., heard immunity for a given country appears to be futile attempt. 4. Quickly vaccinating everyone before COVID bifurcates too much appears to be a fools errand. Anyway, you'd make more progress vaccinating the third world than trying to convince reluctant young people in the first world. In the third world the vaccines would be far more effective at stopping COVID's bifurcation (since they have a lot of young people who could safely be inoculated by getting the virus itself by removing all COVID restrictions) [1] Not a dig at those countries, but a statement of fact based on the mistrust the central asians have since rich countries highjacked UN vaccination programs to advance their geo-political goals. Or poor quality vaccines/equipment that spread diseases amongst Africans. [EDIT] While I am not vaccinated, I did sign up for a vaccine trial and was rejected. So please, try not to make this personal.

tablespoon 5y ago
> "Who are the unvaccinated hurting, exactly?" My kids, who are too young to be vaccinated. I don't appreciate you being blase about their health. My father, who is quite possibly immunocompromised, and may not have acquired a strong immunity from his vaccine.

nezt0 5y ago

As others have pointed out, the long term side effects of this vaccine could take years to fully be known. To make matters worse, it's not a traditional exogenous antigen vaccine -- it's literally synthetic biology... an entirely man made RNA sequence. The idea that the long term side effects of a therapeutic that uses genetic engineer at this level are known is absolutely laughable. They are just setting the precedent for future mandated gene therapy injections (which will grow more complex, and are essentially little biological computer programs). The future is here folks. We live in a science fiction movie. I expect full blown societal collapse soon if the totalitarian take over plan doesn't work. Maybe folks should have listened to Peter Thiel in 2019 when he called Google treasonous.

version_five 5y ago

It saddens me to see that all the top comments on these posts are just some empty populist yelling, variations on "good, after all, there's a war going on". And counterpoints end up being strawmen about vaccines not working anyway. Whatever your end conclusion about whether this is a good move, it's a complex issue that balances a lot of things and is worthy of serious discussion. Instead we get basically an online newspaper comments section filled with shallow or nonexistent points. It's like covid turns everyone toward the lowest forms of debate. HN probably had the most sensible discussions of any site on the internet, so if this is happening here, I can only guess how others are discussing it. I do wonder if tech people are more prone to seeing things in black and white and advocating technological "fixes" over societal compromises, but that's just my speculation.

TulliusCicero 5y ago
It's not actually very complex, and in fact for public schools was already a settled issue. It's only become controversial because of rising anti-vaxx sentiment and conspiratorial thinking. Just because something has become a flashpoint issue doesn't mean it's complex. Gay marriage was also controversial for a long time, despite being quite straightforward.
- deleted 5y ago
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- Fine-Cut4983 5y ago
  How did almost every human in all sorts of varying societies fail to understand something quite straightforward for almost the entire duration of human existence?
- azth 5y ago
  Homosexual marriage is not straight forward: https://www.kirkdurston.com/blog/unwin https://www.kirkdurston.com/blog/unwin
astura 5y ago
>Whatever your end conclusion about whether this is a good move, it's a complex issue that balances a lot of things and is worthy of serious discussion. Ok, so why don't you start the "serious discussion" instead of just complaining? What exactly "complex" about it? All 50 states, DC, and Puerto Rico have immunization requirements for enrollment in public schools and many private schools and daycares have similar requirements. On the federal level the military has all sorts of immunization requirements and USCIS have immunization requirements for visa/green card applicants. As a result the vast majority of adults are vaccinated against a whole host of infectious diseases so companies don't usually find it urgent to implement their own policies - vaccine preventable illnesses simply aren't an issue in American offices. We, as a society, have overwhelmingly accepted immunization requirements as a general concept - there's not really much to discuss.

dukeofdoom 5y ago

Well, already job offers: "If you work at Google or Facebook and don't want to get the mandatory vax you can always come and work for Gab. At Gab we respect your medical privacy and do not require an experimental non-FDA approved vaccine that doesn't stop you from getting Covid and includes other high risk side effects including death." Andrew Torba

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