5 ms·
"For that matter, people who prefer an exposure risk to the virus in order to gain robust immunity deserve the freedom to make that choice." I think that would
by Arnt 5y ago
"For that matter, people who prefer an exposure risk to the virus in order to gain robust immunity deserve the freedom to make that choice." I think that would be fine, if that were everything.
But filling the hospitals to capacity so that vaccinated people can't get a bed when they've suffered an accident is something else.
- mrfusion 5y agoCouldn’t you make that same argument any poor health choice such as obesity?
- Arnt 5y agoYes, you could, but most things are in the noise (where I live at least, don't know about the world generally). You may die 20 years earlier without adding a lot of extra working hours for the hospital that treats your final illness, see? Smoking was the only one that made a significant difference, the rest had too small effects to care (when I looked at it, at the time of the great smoking ban debate here, n years ago). Corona is different. It's able to swamp the hospitals, and even the intensive care units, where patients need a lot of expensive working hours in addition to a bed and some floor space.
- mrfusion 5y agoIt’s not as different as you’d think. We had a bad flu season in 2018 that strained a lot of hospitals. https://www.statnews.com/2018/01/15/flu-hospital-pandemics/ https://www.statnews.com/2018/01/15/flu-hospital-pandemics/ Limited hospital resources are just a fact of life until we commit to expanding them.
- Arnt 5y agoThe flu is hardly a "poor health choice", as you put it, and the well-run countries I know well spend a lot of resources on flu vaccination, so what is the conclusion of what you say?
- mbg721 5y agoThey spend a lot of resources on flu shots, the guess at the dominant strain of the year is often wrong, and for most people they're optional.