4 ms·

Apple to require proof of booster shot from vaccinated employees

11 points by daenz 5y ago

version_five 5y ago
> Due to waning efficacy of the primary series of COVID-19 vaccines and the emergence of highly transmissible variants such as Omicron, a booster shot is now part of staying up to date with your COVID-19 vaccination to protect against severe disease I'm probably reading too much into it but: I buy the argument that you want employees vaccinated so they don't spread covid, but now they are asking their workers to do something "to protect against severe disease"? Such a motivation is well outside what is appropriate for an employer to have a say in. Maybe apple should also mandate employees don't smoke, or eat bacon?
- epistasis 5y ago
  Interesting choice of cropping out the first part of the sentence: > Due to waning efficacy of the primary series of COVID-19 vaccines and the emergence of highly transmissible variants such as Omicron, That would seem to undermine your entire characterization of this. Considering that you had to read the sentence to know where to cut it off, your choice of quote seems very deceptive.
  - version_five 5y ago
    I cropped it for conciseness. I don't understand what you think I was hiding, but if you think that preamble helps contextualize the point I was making that's fine, I've added it to my post now.
- ostenning 5y ago
  Agreed, Omicron is so infectious that any argument to 'protect others' is increasingly difficult to justify aside from reducing hospitalizations and by that token perhaps a general health mandate is in order, with monitoring of peoples daily steps, food consumption and drug use. I'm being hyperbolic, but at some point we need to draw a line. Taking peoples livelihoods away due to their health status or beliefs is in my mind akin to fascism. It is discrimination
  - raxxorrax 5y ago
    Never a call for nuance to call something fascism but I assure you that the characters demanding such mandates would be the first to adopt its tenets if politically convenient. Same with the fight against misinformation. People demanding censorship had no problem at all about being lied to about alleged Russian misinformation. It just happened to fit their interests.
bediger4000 5y ago
Seems OK to me. I mean, you're an employee of a job creator. They don't owe you anything. I bet a lot of Apple employees are in at-will-employment states, too.
- version_five 5y ago
  But would you say the same if they said all employees had to exercise daily or log how many vegetables they ate or whatever? In principal I agree that an employer should basically be able to dictate terms of employment and you take them or leave them and the market sorts it out. But there's still nothing wrong with calling out job requirements that are overreach or simply not part of the job, so other employees there can see they're getting a raw deal. Criticizing a policy doesn't mean Apple should be compelled to change it.
  - bediger4000 5y ago
    Pretty much, yeah. Their job, their terms of employment. Any employee can just leave if the terms change to something to onerous. There's lots of jobs open right now, if Apple asks too much, they will lose their best talent.
    - peteradio 5y ago
      Would you also be ok if Government pressured your Employer to impose new conditions?
      - bediger4000 5y ago
        No, the Government has to stay out of business. The business of America is business, so Government should stay in its lane. I'd quit and find a new job if the Government imposed new conditions. Except for National Security reasons, like getting vaccinated. We need to have healthy people to go into the army if we get attacked.
terracottage 5y ago
It continues to amaze me how people go along with this. The shots don't do what was promised. For healthy kids and young people, it is absolutely counterproductive to inject them. It will cause more hospitalizations through side effects than they will prevent. What's more, there is now mounting evidence that omicron favors people who have gotten jabbed. So any notion that you get the jab to protect others is now also in question. Finally, it is now also clear that these shots could have never created herd immunity, because an intramuscular shot does not create an immune response in the mucus membranes, which is your actual first line of defense. So the entirely sales pitch for the shots is also in question. All of this is easy to find if you just bother to actually look around. Stop applauding this, it's unethical and it just serves to cover up the failed promises of shitty politicians, shitty scientists, and their hysterical fans.
- GuB-42 5y ago
  > For healthy kids and young people, it is absolutely counterproductive to inject them. It will cause more hospitalizations through side effects than they will prevent. Wrong. There have been documented side effects of vaccines, notably myocarditis, and even a few deaths that are the direct result of vaccination. But there are thousands of covid deaths of people in their 20s, and hundreds of kids too, a sizable proportion of them healthy. Because we are talking about one-in-a-million chances, maybe vaccinating kids is not worth it, maybe we should put our time and money elsewhere, but the benefit-risk ratio is definitely on the side of vaccination. > What's more, there is now mounting evidence that omicron favors people who have gotten jabbed. It is true that when you look at some country data, you see that the incidence rate for people who are fully vaccinated but not boosted is much higher than those who are vaccinated. You can make the effect disappear by looking closely (Simpson's paradox) but it still merits proper study. But for now, there is no evidence that omicron favors people who have gotten jabbed. At worst, without a booster, some vaccines are ineffective against mild omicron, that one seems to be confirmed. > it is now also clear that these shots could have never created herd immunity 10/10 hindsight > because an intramuscular shot does not create an immune response in the mucus membranes [Citation Needed] Almost all of our vaccines are an intramuscular shot, including ones that were successful at eradicating diseases. If it wasn't an effective route of administration, I think we would have known by now. > All of this is easy to find if you just bother to actually look around. Yes, it is super easy to find crackpot websites. "Proofs" that the earth is flat are easy to find too. So if you think you have better sources, please share. By "looking around" for the most reliable sources, things are clear: omicron is pretty good at escaping vaccine protection, but the benefit/risk ratio is still overwhelmingly in favor of vaccines. > cover up the failed promises of shitty politicians, shitty scientists, and their hysterical fans Politicians are politicians. But the shitty scientists here are the ones who promote treatments after many studies proved their ineffectiveness (hydroxychloroquine, ivermectin,...) instead of solutions that work (vaccines). Looking for alternative treatment, unorthodox solutions and challenging established practices is good, but disregarding further scientific evidence is not. And scientists don't promise things, they make studies base on current data, and draw conclusions, if the data change, their conclusions will too, it is not called failed promises, it is called doing proper science.

11 points by daenz 5y ago

> Due to waning efficacy of the primary series of COVID-19 vaccines and the emergence of highly transmissible variants such as Omicron, a booster shot is now part of staying up to date with your COVID-19 vaccination to protect against severe disease I'm probably reading too much into it but: I buy the argument that you want employees vaccinated so they don't spread covid, but now they are asking their workers to do something "to protect against severe disease"? Such a motivation is well outside what is appropriate for an employer to have a say in. Maybe apple should also mandate employees don't smoke, or eat bacon?

epistasis 5y ago
Interesting choice of cropping out the first part of the sentence: > Due to waning efficacy of the primary series of COVID-19 vaccines and the emergence of highly transmissible variants such as Omicron, That would seem to undermine your entire characterization of this. Considering that you had to read the sentence to know where to cut it off, your choice of quote seems very deceptive.
- version_five 5y ago
  I cropped it for conciseness. I don't understand what you think I was hiding, but if you think that preamble helps contextualize the point I was making that's fine, I've added it to my post now.
ostenning 5y ago
Agreed, Omicron is so infectious that any argument to 'protect others' is increasingly difficult to justify aside from reducing hospitalizations and by that token perhaps a general health mandate is in order, with monitoring of peoples daily steps, food consumption and drug use. I'm being hyperbolic, but at some point we need to draw a line. Taking peoples livelihoods away due to their health status or beliefs is in my mind akin to fascism. It is discrimination
- raxxorrax 5y ago
  Never a call for nuance to call something fascism but I assure you that the characters demanding such mandates would be the first to adopt its tenets if politically convenient. Same with the fight against misinformation. People demanding censorship had no problem at all about being lied to about alleged Russian misinformation. It just happened to fit their interests.

bediger4000 5y ago

Seems OK to me. I mean, you're an employee of a job creator. They don't owe you anything. I bet a lot of Apple employees are in at-will-employment states, too.

version_five 5y ago
But would you say the same if they said all employees had to exercise daily or log how many vegetables they ate or whatever? In principal I agree that an employer should basically be able to dictate terms of employment and you take them or leave them and the market sorts it out. But there's still nothing wrong with calling out job requirements that are overreach or simply not part of the job, so other employees there can see they're getting a raw deal. Criticizing a policy doesn't mean Apple should be compelled to change it.
- bediger4000 5y ago
  Pretty much, yeah. Their job, their terms of employment. Any employee can just leave if the terms change to something to onerous. There's lots of jobs open right now, if Apple asks too much, they will lose their best talent.
  - peteradio 5y ago
    Would you also be ok if Government pressured your Employer to impose new conditions?
    - bediger4000 5y ago
      No, the Government has to stay out of business. The business of America is business, so Government should stay in its lane. I'd quit and find a new job if the Government imposed new conditions. Except for National Security reasons, like getting vaccinated. We need to have healthy people to go into the army if we get attacked.

terracottage 5y ago

It continues to amaze me how people go along with this. The shots don't do what was promised. For healthy kids and young people, it is absolutely counterproductive to inject them. It will cause more hospitalizations through side effects than they will prevent. What's more, there is now mounting evidence that omicron favors people who have gotten jabbed. So any notion that you get the jab to protect others is now also in question. Finally, it is now also clear that these shots could have never created herd immunity, because an intramuscular shot does not create an immune response in the mucus membranes, which is your actual first line of defense. So the entirely sales pitch for the shots is also in question. All of this is easy to find if you just bother to actually look around. Stop applauding this, it's unethical and it just serves to cover up the failed promises of shitty politicians, shitty scientists, and their hysterical fans.

GuB-42 5y ago
> For healthy kids and young people, it is absolutely counterproductive to inject them. It will cause more hospitalizations through side effects than they will prevent. Wrong. There have been documented side effects of vaccines, notably myocarditis, and even a few deaths that are the direct result of vaccination. But there are thousands of covid deaths of people in their 20s, and hundreds of kids too, a sizable proportion of them healthy. Because we are talking about one-in-a-million chances, maybe vaccinating kids is not worth it, maybe we should put our time and money elsewhere, but the benefit-risk ratio is definitely on the side of vaccination. > What's more, there is now mounting evidence that omicron favors people who have gotten jabbed. It is true that when you look at some country data, you see that the incidence rate for people who are fully vaccinated but not boosted is much higher than those who are vaccinated. You can make the effect disappear by looking closely (Simpson's paradox) but it still merits proper study. But for now, there is no evidence that omicron favors people who have gotten jabbed. At worst, without a booster, some vaccines are ineffective against mild omicron, that one seems to be confirmed. > it is now also clear that these shots could have never created herd immunity 10/10 hindsight > because an intramuscular shot does not create an immune response in the mucus membranes [Citation Needed] Almost all of our vaccines are an intramuscular shot, including ones that were successful at eradicating diseases. If it wasn't an effective route of administration, I think we would have known by now. > All of this is easy to find if you just bother to actually look around. Yes, it is super easy to find crackpot websites. "Proofs" that the earth is flat are easy to find too. So if you think you have better sources, please share. By "looking around" for the most reliable sources, things are clear: omicron is pretty good at escaping vaccine protection, but the benefit/risk ratio is still overwhelmingly in favor of vaccines. > cover up the failed promises of shitty politicians, shitty scientists, and their hysterical fans Politicians are politicians. But the shitty scientists here are the ones who promote treatments after many studies proved their ineffectiveness (hydroxychloroquine, ivermectin,...) instead of solutions that work (vaccines). Looking for alternative treatment, unorthodox solutions and challenging established practices is good, but disregarding further scientific evidence is not. And scientists don't promise things, they make studies base on current data, and draw conclusions, if the data change, their conclusions will too, it is not called failed promises, it is called doing proper science.