COVID 45: Those Are Rookie Numbers

[mormont]

Yes, omicron has a high breakthrough rate and even before omicron breakthrough infections were a thing - as they are with all vaccines. No vaccine is 100% effective.

But that's not an argument for saying that the voluntarily unvaccinated should be left alone or that we can't do anything for those who medically can't be vaccinated, still less that we shouldn't try.

There's an awful lot of talk when it comes to vaccines of freedom of choice and rights. But those who can't be vaccinated have rights and we can't accept a serious, indefinite curtailment of their freedoms as just inevitable.

[Heartofice]

51 minutes ago, mormont said:

But that's not an argument for saying that the voluntarily unvaccinated should be left alone

What is the argument for not letting the unvaccinated get on with it? Im curious to know. 
 

52 minutes ago, mormont said:

we can't do anything for those who medically can't be vaccinated, still less that we shouldn't try

What’s the connection here? Why bring up those who can’t be vaccinated? How do the unvaccinated affect those who can’t be vaccinated?

54 minutes ago, mormont said:

But those who can't be vaccinated have rights and we can't accept a serious, indefinite curtailment of their freedoms as just inevitable.

Again what’s the relevance here. How are the unvaccinated curtailing the rights of those who cannot be vaccinated. 
 

As before, in the Uk , it’s not the unvaccinated spreading the virus , it’s not them taking all the space in hospitals.. so what is it about them that requires that’s they are no ‘left alone’. The only real damage they are doing is to themselves at this point, and are they not free to do so?

That is the quite dark and disturbing part about all this, and it reflects a lot of the conversations here. You’ve  ( and others to be fair) tried to invoke the weakest, most pure party ( immunocompromised and people who can’t take the vaccine) and stood yourself out as their champion , against the forces of evil (the unvaccinated) who are threatening to destroy them! “Won’t somebody think of the children!!”

Its just trying to create a dynamic where one side is good and one side is evil.. and oh look, you are on the side of good! What a surprise! 
 

Except it doesn’t work any more. The virus isn’t going away and it’s got nothing to do with the small numbers of people who didn’t get vaccinated. The focus on the unvaccinated in heavily vaccinated countries is nothing more than vindictiveness from those who want to feel superior to someone, a reflection on how they feel about people on a number of different issues, which is why unfortunately Covid is just another one of those issues that tears right down the culture lines. 
 

 

[A wilding]

17 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

As before, in the Uk , it’s not the unvaccinated spreading the virus , it’s not them taking all the space in hospitals.. so what is it about them that requires that’s they are no ‘left alone’. The only real damage they are doing is to themselves at this point, and are they not free to do so?

How do you know that it is not the unvaccinated spreading the virus?

And why should they have to be occupying "all the space" in hospitals before any attempt should be made to reduce their numbers? I mean, I can see the parallel with people choosing to smoke or be overweight, but we do put at least some pressure on smokers and the obese, and it is a great deal easier to get a jab than it is to give up smoking or lose serious weight.

[Week]

Wait no -- let me just move the goalposts and then I can claim victory and moral superiority for my tribe!

Take a breath. Nobody is saying that the unvaccinated are solely responsible for the spread (though, reminder - vaccines lower viral load and lessen duration of shedding - so the unvaccinated are more efficient and effective at spreading the virus).

What is being said is that unvaccinated folks are 8-10x (IIRC) more likely to end up hospitalized which may be lengthy. That fact, even in a highly vaccinated country, coupled with the infectiousness of omicron is doing unnecessary damage to the health care system.

To continue to refute this fact is to say "I don't care about doctors, nurses, or anyone that needs to get health care as much as I care about the unvaccinated folks' feelings." It's absolutely asinine and shows blatant disrespect for folks on the front lines that have been worn to the bone (worldwide) after two years of this.

[Padraig]

4 hours ago, Heartofice said:

You've quite inexplicably proven my point by showing that it isn't unvaccinated  people taking all the space in hospitals at all, so why try and blame them? Why aren't you blaming the triple vaxxed for being old? 

Lets think about "blaming".  Why do we do it?  It has a negative connotation but it obviously can be used in a positive way.

An easy way to check whether there is a purpose around "blaming somebody" is whether that person had any control over what they are being blamed for.  You rightly point at the insanity of blaming somebody for "being old".  Being old is not something that is controllable and thus an innane thing to blame somebody for.

Now, vaccination.  This obviously is something people have control over.

Sure, because of Maths, more people will end up in hospital despite vaccination but the vaccinated did what was required.  The unvaccinated ending up in hospital was very controllable but they choose to ignore medical advice.  That is why they are being blamed.  They had control.  Suggesting we should ignore this is a little silly.

The other point is regarding volume.  Because there are more people that are vaccinated in hospital, you seem to be suggesting that we should focus on the bigger numer.  But that is not how modern processes work.  Look at continuous improvement, lean processes etc.  We all know about "easy wins".  What is the easy win here?  If you are consistent with your views that the virus isn't going away, you shouldn't be focused on the 80% (or whatever) of hospitalisations that are vaccinated.  Since the virus isn't going away, vaccinated people are going to end up in hospital.  But the unvaccinated?  Only if they choose to remain so.

PS: Vindictiveness.  Sure, you can label some people so.  But some people have very personal reasons for being angry at the unvaccinated.   While it may be easy to take the moral ground against vindictiveness, you probably should be wondering more about the "why".

[maarsen]

3 hours ago, Heartofice said:

It will make some difference, not a huge amount,  but the whole point is that it’s not the unvaccinated filling up hospitals in the UK. It’s also not the unvaccinated causing the spread of Omicron.
So really most of this chatter about the unvaccinated is nothing more than signaling to your tribe. 

Being vaccinated I suppose I am signaling to the smarter tribe as opposed to the fuckwit tribe.

[The Anti-Targ]

If the back of the envelope calculation by @A wilding would drop the hospitalisation rate by 138, which is 17%, then I wonder if there is any business or organisation that would scoff at a 17% reduction in a negative metric that affects the capacity of the business or organisation to function optimally? If vaccinating all those unvaxed even lead to just 100 (48%) out of that 208 fewer people admitted in that time that is still a reduction the health system would greatly welcome being a 12% reduction in overall demand.

>/= 10% change in demand on a health system can be the difference between getting by at a stretch, and being overwhelmed. If you want to know whether 10% is "a huge amount", then you have to look at the un / underutilised capacity. If the available capacity is 20%, then 10% is not going to be too much of a problem. If the available capacity is 5% then 10% is going to tip you over into crisis. If the current demand is >100% then any reduction in demand will be greatly appreciated.

[karaddin]

I think the specter of the slippery slope is something that's frequently misused or over exaggerated, but in this particular case I have major reservations that its not. The concepts of bodily autonomy, along with free access to health care, could very easily be undermined by the measures that we take and I'm opposed to making the vaccinations mandatory or restricting access to health care for the unvaccinated. I think those are both precedents that will absolutely be abused for very bad outcomes if we start down that path.

I'm not severely impacted enough to be immunocompromised, but I am "immunoweakened" and tend to take a long time to recover from even mild colds along with already having many of the same issues that long covid causes - I'm terrified of the virus. I'll grant that I'm also privileged to live in a country which did take measures for 18 months and prevented a great many deaths, so perhaps its easier for me to focus on this side of things. I'm also terrified of the ways that my health care of my very existence with my identity could be attacked if the wrong precedents are taken out of this pandemic.

Restrictions on certain activities as an incentive to be vaccinated are one thing, and restrictions on relevant professions due to refusal to be vaccinated is 100% OK by me - if your job is caring for the elderly for example then part of your job is ensuring you don't expose them to unnecessary risk. But actually violating bodily autonomy by forcing vaccination on those who do not consent is a line I'm not comfortable crossing.

If you're only arguing for those other restrictions then I'm not arguing with you, the conversation can get a little hard to follow what's actually being advocated though and want to point out that its not just those from HoI's perspective that think mandatory vaccination is a problematic idea.

[Heartofice]

8 hours ago, Padraig said:

An easy way to check whether there is a purpose around "blaming somebody" is whether that person had any control over what they are being blamed for.  You rightly point at the insanity of blaming somebody for "being old".  Being old is not something that is controllable and thus an innane thing to blame somebody for.

It’s whether the outcome you are blaming on people is something they are responsible for or not.

The unvaccinated are not the reason for large case numbers , and they aren’t the reason for full hospitals. 
They are responsible for their own health at this point, if they decide to not be vaccinated then it’s on them.

8 hours ago, Padraig said:

The other point is regarding volume.  Because there are more people that are vaccinated in hospital, you seem to be suggesting that we should focus on the bigger numer

The point is when looking at hospitalisation numbers, it seems strange at this point to be trying to blame anyone at all. Pointing at a small proportion of that number and going ‘this is all your fault’, just doesn’t work. 
 

There have been some back of the envelope calculations so far,  but that’s really all they are. Given the age and health profile of the people who are unvaccinated any reduction in hospital numbers might be a lot smaller than suggested, but we don’t know. Either way, by focusing on the unvaccinated at this point all you are doing is displaying your own negative personality traits. Is it any different to blaming the overweight for hospital numbers. We know obese people are heavily over represented in hospital numbers for covid,the same people blaming the unvaccinated would very much frown at blaming the overweight for their choices.

8 hours ago, maarsen said:

Being vaccinated I suppose I am signaling to the smarter tribe as opposed to the fuckwit tribe.

There are a lot of fuckwits in that group for sure, but there are also a lot of people who just don’t have all the information, and it’s worth mentioning those for whom the risk profile of the disease is not that high. There are plenty of younger people who’ve already had the disease, for whom the benefits of vaccination are not very high. Are we going to be pointing the finger at them? 

 

8 hours ago, Padraig said:

PS: Vindictiveness.  Sure, you can label some people so.  But some people have very personal reasons for being angry at the unvaccinated.   While it may be easy to take the moral ground against vindictiveness, you probably should be wondering more about the "why".

I understand that people are annoyed, I’m annoyed. We’ve had 2 years of this shit and it hasn’t been fun for anyone. We’ve isolated and got the jab and we expect others to do their duty cos we did. But even that dynamic doesn’t make sense any more because vaccination isn’t really about a public good now, it’s a personal choice to protect yourself. The vaccines are not protecting others, even if we have been told they did in the past. So we need to stop viewing vaccination through a moral lens, and getting on our high horses about it. 
 

People are angry, but they are pointing at the wrong targets. 

[DireWolfSpirit]

Sarah Palin has Covid........

Again.

This time it's delaying her highly publicized suit against the New York Times.

 

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/sarah-palin-covid-nyt-lawsuit_n_61eec099e4b04db85c861df6

Palin has been quoted saying she will not get vaccinated due to her "Belief in Science".

[Kalbear]

Yeah, other than all the data indicating that the vaccines are protecting others the vaccines don't do shit to protect others

HOW DARE THEY

[Heartofice]

48 minutes ago, Kalibuster said:

Yeah, other than all the data indicating that the vaccines are protecting others the vaccines don't do shit to protect others

HOW DARE THEY

Except for the data that says they don't

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/19/health/omicron-vaccines-efficacy.html

 

Quote

All vaccines still seem to provide a significant degree of protection against serious illness from Omicron, which is the most crucial goal. But only the Pfizer and Moderna shots, when reinforced by a booster, appear to have initial success at stopping infections, and these vaccines are unavailable in most of the world.

The other shots — including those from AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson and vaccines manufactured in China and Russia — do little to nothing to stop the spread of Omicron, early research shows. And because most countries have built their inoculation programs around these vaccines, the gap could have a profound impact on the course of the pandemic.

So where do we aim our ire now? Should we be throwing rocks at people who have only had two shots? What about those disgusting peasants who got vaccinated with AZ  or J&J? Why aren't we putting more pressure on them and throwing them into camps or something? What about a few months down the line when the booster wears off, do we need to start spitting at people in the street if they haven't had their fourth shot? 
 

[mormont]

3 hours ago, karaddin said:

I think the specter of the slippery slope is something that's frequently misused or over exaggerated, but in this particular case I have major reservations that its not. The concepts of bodily autonomy, along with free access to health care, could very easily be undermined by the measures that we take and I'm opposed to making the vaccinations mandatory or restricting access to health care for the unvaccinated. I think those are both precedents that will absolutely be abused for very bad outcomes if we start down that path.

The flaw in this argument, though, is that other vaccinations are already mandatory in many countries and it did not lead to these bad outcomes.

A good example for this kind of discussion is mumps. Mumps vaccines are only around 88% effective. That means that 12% of vaccinated people (1 in 8) will get the disease. Since vaccinated people hugely outnumber the unvaccinated, that means that more of them become infected and (per HoI's argument) the MMR vaccine is mostly about protecting yourself, it isn't a public health measure and it should not be mandatory. 

Of course this is nonsense. We've seen what happens when parents decide to stop getting their kids MMR vaccinations and it is unpleasant. And that's when the disease is not pandemic or endemic. 

[karaddin]

@mormont That's a fair point for countries where it's the case, I guess my concern is that the political situation is a lot more fraught now and just because those mandates already exist doesn't mean they generate the same level of heat as adding this will. We live in insane times now and facebook wasn't a thing then. I'm pretty sure those vaccines are not mandated in Aus though, so that's shaping my view of it. This shit wasn't controversial and mandates weren't even necessary in the past here.

My other concern, about things like excluding unvaccinated individuals from access to free health care, could spill over into things like excluding someone from free access to certain procedures if they're obese, cutting smokers off from cancer treatments etc. Granted no one in this thread is advocating for limiting health care access for the unvaccinated so I'm bringing that a little out of left field, but it has been argued for in the Aus media sphere. Again some of these concerns are specific to the time in which we're living.

[Heartofice]

Just now, karaddin said:

Granted no one in this thread is advocating for limiting health care access for the unvaccinated so I'm bringing that a little out of left field, but it has been argued for in the Aus media sphere. Again some of these concerns are specific to the time in which we're living.

That has been mentioned before, and it's certainly something I've seen discussed elsewhere. 

[lessthanluke]

17 hours ago, Week said:

 

 

[mormont]

29 minutes ago, karaddin said:

My other concern, about things like excluding unvaccinated individuals from access to free health care, could spill over into things like excluding someone from free access to certain procedures if they're obese, cutting smokers off from cancer treatments etc.

Yeah, that's a horse of a different colour. I can support measures like allowing employers to have a vaccine mandate, but at no stage would I support limiting healthcare for anyone who gets ill - vaccinated or not. 

[RhaenysBee]

58 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

“The other shots — including those from AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson and vaccines manufactured in China and Russia”

 this is adorable. The other shots - including those from AstraZeneca, Johnson&Johnson and the other ones not worthy of being mentioned by name as only their inferior and undesirable eastern origin should be enough to distinguish them and say all that needs to be conveyed about them. No, seriously, let’s be generous and assume I’m reading too much into this and it’s more like, The other shots - including those from AstraZeneca, Johnson&Johnson and those eastern vaccines I can’t be bothered to google the names of. Not sure why this was article excerpt without context is the target of my daily annoyance and frustration, I’m certain it’s unjustified and unnecessary in the grand scheme of things. Oh well. 

we have a 50% positivity rate at this point. Which isn’t surprising as the absolute numbers are so very low. Out of 18000 tests 9000ish came back positive yesterday. 

my father finally decided to get tested because his runny nose won’t go away? I’m not sure exactly. I just hope that his booster took effect in time and he will keep improving. 

[Knight Of Winter]

A lot of this is missing the point - especially these ad nausem assertions how vaccinated are better protected and less likely to spread the virus than unvaccinated. Yeah, that's true - but what of it? Does that mean that getting vaccinated is the correct personal choice - yes, certainly. But it doesn't explain this rancor, this malevolent animus I'm seeing here directed towards unvaccinated. We all make bad lifestyle choices on a daily basis - and I've yet to see any one of them incur such societal wrath as not vaxxing. 

It's a matter of principle, of basic ideological foundations on which to build society on - and sovereignty of the individual is one of the core ones. We allow people to make all sorts of shitty decisions that impact themselves as well as others. People are free to be severe alcoholics. They're free to be obese. Or to vote for obviously shitty political candidates. Or to smoke. Or to be crappy husbands, wives, friends and coworkers. Or to be sexually promiscuous without any protection, thus spreading STDs all around the place. Many of these affect not only the individual in question, but others around them as well - either directly (getting STDs or second-hand smoking) or indirectly (families of severe alcoholics), and some of them affects entire societies (electing awful political leaders; or obese having greater chance of being a burden to the healthcare system). 

Do we, in any of these cases, mock and browbeat the "sinners" into submission? Well, no. We hold a little sympathy, knowing that each of us had our demons that we succumbed to at some point in our lives. We show a little solidarity and pay for their mistakes, knowing that they'll pay for ours when the time comes. We allow them (like everyone else) to lead their lives however they see fit, as long as they abide by the law.  We campaign, we educate, we offer better alternatives - but ultimately we accept their choices.

All in all, while I understand being pissed at willingly unvaccinated (personally I'm not and don't care whether someone is jabbed or not; however I understand folks who are pissed off), ultimately I don't see how it's correct to view their choice as some kind of horrible moral transgression. Or them as a group which should be shamed and battered until they break.
 

4 hours ago, karaddin said:

Restrictions on certain activities as an incentive to be vaccinated are one thing, and restrictions on relevant professions due to refusal to be vaccinated is 100% OK by me - if your job is caring for the elderly for example then part of your job is ensuring you don't expose them to unnecessary risk. But actually violating bodily autonomy by forcing vaccination on those who do not consent is a line I'm not comfortable crossing.

Also, this. Seconded.

[Heartofice]

14 minutes ago, RhaenysBee said:

 this is adorable. The other shots - including those from AstraZeneca, Johnson&Johnson and the other ones not worthy of being mentioned by name as only their inferior and undesirable eastern origin should be enough to distinguish them and say all that needs to be conveyed about them.

Well except for all the many millions of people who've been jabbed with them, especially in poorer countries because they were cheaper and more available. Glad to see you want to create a brand new class divide 'oh my god, you are AZ? disgusting, please don't come near me!'
 

4 minutes ago, Knight Of Winter said:

Do we, in any of these cases, mock and browbeat the "sinners" into submission? Well, no. We hold a little sympathy, knowing that each of us had our demons that we succumbed to at some point in our lives. We show a little solidarity and pay for their mistakes, knowing that they'll pay for ours when the time comes. We allow them (like everyone else) to lead their lives however they see fit, as long as they abide by the law.  We campaign, we educate, we offer better alternatives - but ultimately we accept their choices.

It's the very same people here who are more than happy to mock and browbeat unvaccinated 'sinners' who will scream and shout were anyone to point a finger at smokers or the obese for their choices. There is just a strange religiosity to all of it, some people are good and pure, some are innocent and need protection, and some are unclean sinners who need to pay for their unworthiness without forgiveness. All very old school old testament stuff.