5 ms·

>It's not a personal decision anymore than the MMR or polio vaccines. I am tired of this false equivalence. Shall we compare them? The MMR and polio vaccines:

by _dain_ 5y ago

>It's not a personal decision anymore than the MMR or polio vaccines. I am tired of this false equivalence. Shall we compare them? The MMR and polio vaccines: - are very effective - give lifelong immunity - target very dangerous diseases - diseases which are particularly dangerous to children The Corona vaccines: - are mildly effective (they reduce symptoms certainly, but infections are still very common among the vaccinated, and so is spread) - immunity fades rapidly - target a disease which is not that dangerous - and is particularly not-dangerous for children I can see why it may be justifiable to mandate MMR and polio shots (though actually, where I live neither are mandated). The people most at risk (children) are not able to give consent, so it is arguably justifiable for the state to override parental wishes in such cases. I cannot see how it is justifiable to mandate the corona vaccines. The people who are actually at serious risk are perfectly capable of giving consent -- or not. Forcing it is a violation of bodily autonomy, pure and simple. "Public health" cannot be a universal excuse to tell people what to do. Obesity is also a major risk factor for coronavirus; are we also going to bar fat people from participation in society, on the excuse that they are burdening the health system?

raverbashing 5y ago
> are mildly effective Are very effective in preventing serious disease > target a disease which is not that dangerous The 700k dead in the US might disagree (I mean, those that didn't die neck deep in the mud believing it to be a mere puddle)
- _dain_ 5y ago
  They don't reliably stop you from contracting it, they don't reliably stop you from spreading it, they don't reliably stop symptoms. They are "mildly effective" by any reasonable comparison to any decent pre-existing vaccine (no, the flu vaccine doesn't count). And they are getting less effective by the day. Already we are hearing talk of third, fourth, fifth booster shots -- for a vaccine that is less than a year old. Have you ever heard of such a thing before, for any other shot? As for 700k deaths -- yes, 700k mostly old, mostly already unhealthy deaths in a country of 320 million people, tallied across two years. This is not a civilization-ending plague. Moreover, almost all of the at-risk demographic already has been vaccinated. So if they are as effective as you imply, what is the justification for forcing it on everyone else? You cannot simultaneously claim that they are so effective, and at the same time that everyone must be vaccinated in order to protect the at-risk people who are themselves already vaccinated. It is a deranged contradiction.
  - bryanlarsen 5y ago
    2.7% of the population is immunocompromised. That's who the vaccine mandates are protecting. https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/871290 https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/871290 As the father two premature children who were highly immunocompromised for the first 6 months of their life or so, this is a very personal issue.
    - _dain_ 5y ago
      That immunocompromised portion of the population are not going to be protected either way. Did you not read what I said? The vaccine does not prevent transmission! Herd immunity will not happen with such a leaky vaccine.
      - bryanlarsen 5y ago
        The vaccine doesn't have to prevent transmission for herd immunity to occur. It just has to push the R-value for spread under 1. And it does that very effectively. It's not particular effective at preventing breakthrough infections from spreading the disease, but it is quite effective at preventing infection in the first place.
  - raverbashing 5y ago
    > They don't reliably stop you from contracting it, they don't reliably stop you from spreading it, they don't reliably stop symptoms. You might want to look up the actual efficiencies of common vaccines (and how many iterations did it take to get them to that point) > Have you ever heard of such a thing before, for any other shot? A vaccine that was proven to be reasonably effective and with minor side effects in only one year? It's the result of several decades of innovation. Or do you think every previous vaccine was perfect?
bryanlarsen 5y ago
- effectiveness. The COVID vaccines are 95%+ effective against the original COVID virus. This is better than some of the vaccines we routinely give out, and worse than some. - lifelong immunity One of our routine vaccinations (tetanus) needs booster shots every ten years. Some routine vaccinations need 4 doses before effectiveness. And this is for diseases that aren't mutating. The COVID "waning immunity" story is a red herring. All vaccinations only produce antibodies for a few months -- B cells etc provide immunity after a few months for COVID and every other viral vaccine. - target a disease which is not that dangerous COVID has a fatality rate between 0.2 and 1.0 %. This is higher than the death rate for measles and many other diseases we routinely vaccinate for. - and is particularly not-dangerous for children 700 dead children in the US would disagree. It's not a high rate of death but is similar to other causes (https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/nejmsr1804754 https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/nejmsr1804754) If we had to live with that rate of childhood death we could, but vaccines are so cheap and side-effect free we shouldn't have to.
- _dain_ 5y ago
  The original COVID virus is practically defunct. It was outcompeted by other strains. Effectiveness is sharply declining. Ten years is much longer than ten months, which is how long the corona vaccines have been around. Waning immunity is not a red herring. The entire mass vaccination strategy was predicated on the idea that everyone would get one or two doses and the virus would be defeated and we go back to normal. Spare me this motte/bailey sophistry. Measles: again you conflate a disease that attacks children with a disease that does not. The 0.2-1% mortality figure for measles is almost entirely concentrated among children. Rate of child death from corona is negligible. You bring up 700 dead children from corona -- yes this is a tragedy, but it is comparable to influenza. A bad flu season will see something like 500-600 under-18s die in USA over course of a year (and is your 700 figure for a single year, or summed across both pandemic years?). I am sorry but we cannot shut down society for this.
  - bryanlarsen 5y ago
    Measles has a death rate of 1 in 1000 children. That's massively lower than COVID, which is some unknown amount higher than 2 in 1000 of the entire population. I didn't say we shut down for 700 deaths. But that number is enough to justify minor interventions, like masking until a vaccine is available for every one, and then vaccinating broadly.
mewpmewp2 5y ago
I'm also not against corona vaccines, but I'm definitely against making them mandatory or having mandatory pressure on this. If it had been 10+ years on market and known to be safe, I would maybe consider it, but there's data and reports coming in of risks that were never mentioned in the early 2021. What other risks aren't we aware of yet, if it took us so long time to find out about those. And, I would be fine with using a cheap testing kit each morning before going out. But I want to be able to choose to have enough data to feel comfortable about taking this vaccine. Is that too much to ask?

by _dain_ 5y ago

raverbashing 5y ago

> are mildly effective Are very effective in preventing serious disease > target a disease which is not that dangerous The 700k dead in the US might disagree (I mean, those that didn't die neck deep in the mud believing it to be a mere puddle)

_dain_ 5y ago
They don't reliably stop you from contracting it, they don't reliably stop you from spreading it, they don't reliably stop symptoms. They are "mildly effective" by any reasonable comparison to any decent pre-existing vaccine (no, the flu vaccine doesn't count). And they are getting less effective by the day. Already we are hearing talk of third, fourth, fifth booster shots -- for a vaccine that is less than a year old. Have you ever heard of such a thing before, for any other shot? As for 700k deaths -- yes, 700k mostly old, mostly already unhealthy deaths in a country of 320 million people, tallied across two years. This is not a civilization-ending plague. Moreover, almost all of the at-risk demographic already has been vaccinated. So if they are as effective as you imply, what is the justification for forcing it on everyone else? You cannot simultaneously claim that they are so effective, and at the same time that everyone must be vaccinated in order to protect the at-risk people who are themselves already vaccinated. It is a deranged contradiction.
- bryanlarsen 5y ago
  2.7% of the population is immunocompromised. That's who the vaccine mandates are protecting. https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/871290 https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/871290 As the father two premature children who were highly immunocompromised for the first 6 months of their life or so, this is a very personal issue.
  - _dain_ 5y ago
    That immunocompromised portion of the population are not going to be protected either way. Did you not read what I said? The vaccine does not prevent transmission! Herd immunity will not happen with such a leaky vaccine.
    - bryanlarsen 5y ago
      The vaccine doesn't have to prevent transmission for herd immunity to occur. It just has to push the R-value for spread under 1. And it does that very effectively. It's not particular effective at preventing breakthrough infections from spreading the disease, but it is quite effective at preventing infection in the first place.
- raverbashing 5y ago
  > They don't reliably stop you from contracting it, they don't reliably stop you from spreading it, they don't reliably stop symptoms. You might want to look up the actual efficiencies of common vaccines (and how many iterations did it take to get them to that point) > Have you ever heard of such a thing before, for any other shot? A vaccine that was proven to be reasonably effective and with minor side effects in only one year? It's the result of several decades of innovation. Or do you think every previous vaccine was perfect?

bryanlarsen 5y ago

- effectiveness. The COVID vaccines are 95%+ effective against the original COVID virus. This is better than some of the vaccines we routinely give out, and worse than some. - lifelong immunity One of our routine vaccinations (tetanus) needs booster shots every ten years. Some routine vaccinations need 4 doses before effectiveness. And this is for diseases that aren't mutating. The COVID "waning immunity" story is a red herring. All vaccinations only produce antibodies for a few months -- B cells etc provide immunity after a few months for COVID and every other viral vaccine. - target a disease which is not that dangerous COVID has a fatality rate between 0.2 and 1.0 %. This is higher than the death rate for measles and many other diseases we routinely vaccinate for. - and is particularly not-dangerous for children 700 dead children in the US would disagree. It's not a high rate of death but is similar to other causes (https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/nejmsr1804754 https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/nejmsr1804754) If we had to live with that rate of childhood death we could, but vaccines are so cheap and side-effect free we shouldn't have to.

_dain_ 5y ago
The original COVID virus is practically defunct. It was outcompeted by other strains. Effectiveness is sharply declining. Ten years is much longer than ten months, which is how long the corona vaccines have been around. Waning immunity is not a red herring. The entire mass vaccination strategy was predicated on the idea that everyone would get one or two doses and the virus would be defeated and we go back to normal. Spare me this motte/bailey sophistry. Measles: again you conflate a disease that attacks children with a disease that does not. The 0.2-1% mortality figure for measles is almost entirely concentrated among children. Rate of child death from corona is negligible. You bring up 700 dead children from corona -- yes this is a tragedy, but it is comparable to influenza. A bad flu season will see something like 500-600 under-18s die in USA over course of a year (and is your 700 figure for a single year, or summed across both pandemic years?). I am sorry but we cannot shut down society for this.
- bryanlarsen 5y ago
  Measles has a death rate of 1 in 1000 children. That's massively lower than COVID, which is some unknown amount higher than 2 in 1000 of the entire population. I didn't say we shut down for 700 deaths. But that number is enough to justify minor interventions, like masking until a vaccine is available for every one, and then vaccinating broadly.

mewpmewp2 5y ago

I'm also not against corona vaccines, but I'm definitely against making them mandatory or having mandatory pressure on this. If it had been 10+ years on market and known to be safe, I would maybe consider it, but there's data and reports coming in of risks that were never mentioned in the early 2021. What other risks aren't we aware of yet, if it took us so long time to find out about those. And, I would be fine with using a cheap testing kit each morning before going out. But I want to be able to choose to have enough data to feel comfortable about taking this vaccine. Is that too much to ask?