4 ms·

Yes, it is.

mynegation 5y ago
So it is a personal choice. Would you be OK with the consequences of qualifying it as such? What if an unvaccinated (by personal choice) person comes down with COVID and has to be hospitalized or - worse - put into ICU. Do you think they would be OK if doctors, faced with the crunch of beds, place them into a second tier, behind all the breakthrough cases? Hospitals do not do that currently, but this is not unheard of (e.g. bumping smokers and alcoholic patients in organ donation queues). I am willing to accept this is a personal choice if people making that choice accept responsibility for it.
- betwixthewires 5y ago
  They accept responsibility by paying for medical care, paying insurance, or paying taxes into a socialized healthcare system, depending on which country you live. Refusing to treat sick people is not forcing them to take responsibility for their decisions, it is coercing them into making a decision they don't want to make, and I think k you know that.
  - DFHippie 5y ago
    Imagine this scenario: You have one ICU bed and two people with gunshot wounds. One got the wound because he played with a gun and shot himself. The other got the wound because he was shot accidentally by the first person. Only one person gets the bed. Which one do you give the bed to? Let's make it a little more topical: Both people were told not to play with the gun and that there were insufficient ICU beds. The first person still played with the gun and shot himself and another person. This was a personal choice he made. His luck was against him (and the person he shot). Let's make it more topical still: The two people were told, "Look, we know you want to play with guns. We really don't want you to. Receiving treatment for gunshot wounds is less likely to lead to long life than simply not getting shot, and we have other illnesses we need to treat. Here's an additional incentive: if we don't have sufficient medical resources to treat everyone, the people who ignore this warning will get treated after those who don't." Yes, this is coercion, inasmuch as it is influencing their decision, but under this definition of coercion, coercion hardly seems like something to worry about, certainly not as much as getting shot.
    - jjgreen 5y ago
      You give the bed to the person with the worse wounds.
      - rpmisms 5y ago
        Hey look, somebody knows their medical ethics! Allowing doctors to choose who they'd rather help first is a bad path to take.
  - kristjansson 5y ago
    > paying insurance Should vaccine refusal then result in increased premiums, or increased coinsurance for covid-related care? How many people would make the choice if they had to bear even part of the expected value of their increased medical costs themselves?
    - betwixthewires 5y ago
      Maybe, but that is for insurance companies to decide. Just like they decide rates for smokers, obese people, etc. Although I don't know of any insurance companies that have rates for people that have not undergone certain medical procedures. That sounds unethical to me.
      - random314 5y ago
        It's a cost benefit analysis. Why is it unethical? Why should the vaccinated population pay for unvaccinated welfare queens?
  - random314 5y ago
    Personal choice and responsibility runs both ways. Unvaccinated welfare queens must be screened out of the system.
dekhn 5y ago
no, public health isn't a personal choice: public health exists to apply population wide, standardized (possibly tailored somewhat) principles and actions and their loss function is to minimize overall suffering. Personal choice goes against that, because many people's personal choices will be selfish or convenient to them while putting other people in harm's way. Within a large society, we must be cognizant of the likely impact of our decisions, but history shows that most people will not do so, and therefore must be compelled, legally, to take actions which are for the best of society. Some freedom is defined and assigned at the federal, not personal level, with the goal of ensuring the national survives existential challenges (of which COVID may be one).
- betwixthewires 5y ago
  > Some freedom is defined and assigned at the federal, not personal level... That's one philosophy of governance. I believe it to be fundamentally incorrect. But that's your philosophy and your view on this topic stems from that. I get your point, I just disagree wholeheartedly. I have a right to be selfish. I owe no obligation to anyone else that I have not voluntarily entered into. If you want to redefine "putting other people in harms way" to include breathing the air around me without getting a medical procedure you can, but it is wrong IMO.
  - dekhn 5y ago
    This isn't just a philosophy of governance, it's how nearly every country in this world works. You clearly have limits on the freedoms you claim. For example, if you live in the US and you're male, you're subject to the draft and the government will put you in jail otherwise. There are no universal human rights to be selfish (or any others, either).
    - betwixthewires 5y ago
      > You clearly have limits on the freedoms you claim We aren't talking about how things are, we are talking about how things should be, specifically, whether there should be vaccine mandates or not. Other existing violations of rights are wrong also. So it is fundamentally about philosophy of governance. You believe society should come first, individuals can be compelled to benefit society even potentially at great cost to themselves, and that a person is morally wrong for not wanting to go along with that. I believe that it is morally wrong to expect a person to value anyone over themselves that they have not chosen to, or to be compelled to do anything on behalf of someone else.

Yes, it is.

So it is a personal choice. Would you be OK with the consequences of qualifying it as such? What if an unvaccinated (by personal choice) person comes down with COVID and has to be hospitalized or - worse - put into ICU. Do you think they would be OK if doctors, faced with the crunch of beds, place them into a second tier, behind all the breakthrough cases? Hospitals do not do that currently, but this is not unheard of (e.g. bumping smokers and alcoholic patients in organ donation queues). I am willing to accept this is a personal choice if people making that choice accept responsibility for it.

betwixthewires 5y ago
They accept responsibility by paying for medical care, paying insurance, or paying taxes into a socialized healthcare system, depending on which country you live. Refusing to treat sick people is not forcing them to take responsibility for their decisions, it is coercing them into making a decision they don't want to make, and I think k you know that.
- DFHippie 5y ago
  Imagine this scenario: You have one ICU bed and two people with gunshot wounds. One got the wound because he played with a gun and shot himself. The other got the wound because he was shot accidentally by the first person. Only one person gets the bed. Which one do you give the bed to? Let's make it a little more topical: Both people were told not to play with the gun and that there were insufficient ICU beds. The first person still played with the gun and shot himself and another person. This was a personal choice he made. His luck was against him (and the person he shot). Let's make it more topical still: The two people were told, "Look, we know you want to play with guns. We really don't want you to. Receiving treatment for gunshot wounds is less likely to lead to long life than simply not getting shot, and we have other illnesses we need to treat. Here's an additional incentive: if we don't have sufficient medical resources to treat everyone, the people who ignore this warning will get treated after those who don't." Yes, this is coercion, inasmuch as it is influencing their decision, but under this definition of coercion, coercion hardly seems like something to worry about, certainly not as much as getting shot.
  - jjgreen 5y ago
    You give the bed to the person with the worse wounds.
    - rpmisms 5y ago
      Hey look, somebody knows their medical ethics! Allowing doctors to choose who they'd rather help first is a bad path to take.
- kristjansson 5y ago
  > paying insurance Should vaccine refusal then result in increased premiums, or increased coinsurance for covid-related care? How many people would make the choice if they had to bear even part of the expected value of their increased medical costs themselves?
  - betwixthewires 5y ago
    Maybe, but that is for insurance companies to decide. Just like they decide rates for smokers, obese people, etc. Although I don't know of any insurance companies that have rates for people that have not undergone certain medical procedures. That sounds unethical to me.
    - random314 5y ago
      It's a cost benefit analysis. Why is it unethical? Why should the vaccinated population pay for unvaccinated welfare queens?
- random314 5y ago
  Personal choice and responsibility runs both ways. Unvaccinated welfare queens must be screened out of the system.

dekhn 5y ago

no, public health isn't a personal choice: public health exists to apply population wide, standardized (possibly tailored somewhat) principles and actions and their loss function is to minimize overall suffering. Personal choice goes against that, because many people's personal choices will be selfish or convenient to them while putting other people in harm's way. Within a large society, we must be cognizant of the likely impact of our decisions, but history shows that most people will not do so, and therefore must be compelled, legally, to take actions which are for the best of society. Some freedom is defined and assigned at the federal, not personal level, with the goal of ensuring the national survives existential challenges (of which COVID may be one).

betwixthewires 5y ago
> Some freedom is defined and assigned at the federal, not personal level... That's one philosophy of governance. I believe it to be fundamentally incorrect. But that's your philosophy and your view on this topic stems from that. I get your point, I just disagree wholeheartedly. I have a right to be selfish. I owe no obligation to anyone else that I have not voluntarily entered into. If you want to redefine "putting other people in harms way" to include breathing the air around me without getting a medical procedure you can, but it is wrong IMO.
- dekhn 5y ago
  This isn't just a philosophy of governance, it's how nearly every country in this world works. You clearly have limits on the freedoms you claim. For example, if you live in the US and you're male, you're subject to the draft and the government will put you in jail otherwise. There are no universal human rights to be selfish (or any others, either).
  - betwixthewires 5y ago
    > You clearly have limits on the freedoms you claim We aren't talking about how things are, we are talking about how things should be, specifically, whether there should be vaccine mandates or not. Other existing violations of rights are wrong also. So it is fundamentally about philosophy of governance. You believe society should come first, individuals can be compelled to benefit society even potentially at great cost to themselves, and that a person is morally wrong for not wanting to go along with that. I believe that it is morally wrong to expect a person to value anyone over themselves that they have not chosen to, or to be compelled to do anything on behalf of someone else.