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There might be an argument to be made there. I don't know how seriously it would be taken. The reality is that not only were these vaccines trialed in 10s of thousands of patients, after the FDA's EUA, 237M doses have been administered so far in the US under an umbrella of pharmacovigilance, and the safety record has been excellent. Certainly I understand this and took the vaccine at my first opportunity. It's not just me who sees it this way, Anthony Fauci, Eric Topol and countless other experts have publicly stated that while there were legitimate reasons for hesitancy *at first* - there are some new vaccine technologies and things were developed quickly, *but*, that the reasons for such hesitancy evaporated long ago with all the positive practical experience that there's been in deploying these vaccines. It's not a big unknown anymore like it was last fall, it's known very well by now.
The FDA for various reasons isn't quick to approve applications for approval of new drugs and vaccines, that's just the way it is. Also, formally, I believe the vaccine makers haven't yet submitted the additional packages of data yet to apply for full approval. Hopefully, these actions will be expedited, as one line that seems to be making the rounds is that these vaccines are "still experimental" and shouldn't be trusted. That's not at all an accurate depiction as I described above, but the bottom line is, they need to take away every reason they can for people to justify fear. It doesn't matter if they are wrong, just do it.
This country has enjoyed remarkable insulation from terrorist attacks on our home soil for the past 20 years, that is no random coincidence. Sure there has been bad policy as always to go along with the good, but that's totally irrelevant to my point about our learned lesson of relying on the "good of mankind".
As for ongoing rules:
a. not everybody has had the chance to be fully vaccinated.
b. vaccines are not 100% effective against infection or spread.
c. we have yet to see how they play out against the latest variants.
There is still potential for the pandemic to wreak devastation to public health and the economy if we don't do this correctly. I don't believe we are there yet, the numbers are still way too high.
The overton window of responses in the US is a lot more narrow than it's portrayed. The differences between the most strict states and the most lax states are negligible, we can see that from the data. We've been in the crappy middle ground where the virus hasn't been eliminated but our freedoms are still curtailed.
In fact the virus has been given an ideal set of conditions to train. The prolonged half-measures have put some pressure on the virus to adapt but not enough pressure that it can't overcome. That's probably why we are seeing more contagious variants popping up. During the Spanish Flu it doesn't seem like there were any major variants that became dominant. The disease ran itself out within a year or two anyway with essentially no preventantive measures taken.
We do have to rely on the deemers in a sense here, because we have to hope the vaccines are good enough. If they are almost, but not quite good enough the results will likely be catastrophic. We have two parts to the immune system, an innate immune response and a learned response.
My understanding (could be mistaken) is that the vaccines train our learned response immune system to react to a list of identifying features of the spike protein, something like ~100 characteristic features of the coronavirus. It learns to identify those features and how to react to them in a particular way. That happens during shot #1 and then during #2 we "test" that immune response on another picture of a spike protein, and that reinforces the method of action.
Once the immune system learns to react this way, that learned response may override the innate immune system. That is the immune system that protects young people and others who have mild or asymptomatic carriers of COVID-19. So in the event that the vaccines work but not quite well enough, eventually a variant can develop that isn't stopped by the vaccine. If that were to happen, then everyone who took the vaccine (such as myself) might be extremely vulnerable to that strain, since the vaccine would be ineffective and we have shut off our innate immune response to the virus, leaving us utterly defenceless.
If that were to happen, it will happen regardless of whether we social distance or mask or whatever. Obviously those measures were not robust enough to stop the virus. If we had done a real true hardcore lockdown for six weeks with every street is a ghosttown and people getting locked up for leaving the house for any reason (not saying we should have done that) it would have been the only way to maybe possibly stop the virus. We are way beyond the point of that being an option now.
It wouldn't make that much of a difference at this point as it was an emergency and the deployment already happened. We don't get any "extra" with approval at this point.
Teachers wanted to be vaccinated to go back so it's only logical that most public sector employees want the vaccines. I can't really see that much of a hesitancy at this point. First we complained of who is next and now we have vaccines just sitting there. It's either a one or two shot vaccine, it's not like it's 10.
there is a general expectation that an employer has a given amount of safety for a job to be performed. If there are are conditions that has to be addressed within the job description. Some jobs obviously have danger like coal mining and being a fisherman but general administration should not have that much of a risk.
How may people live or work in areas with significant lead paint and asbestos? Well there's mitigation for that. Likewise this is the only real way to lower the spread if we want people in offices. Now if someone doesn't want to come in that's a different issue. If you *really* want to go back into the office this will certainly pass the legal smell test.
The overton window of responses in the US is a lot more narrow than it's portrayed. The differences between the most strict states and the most lax states are negligible, we can see that from the data. We've been in the crappy middle ground where the virus hasn't been eliminated but our freedoms are still curtailed.
In fact the virus has been given an ideal set of conditions to train. The prolonged half-measures have put some pressure on the virus to adapt but not enough pressure that it can't overcome. That's probably why we are seeing more contagious variants popping up. During the Spanish Flu it doesn't seem like there were any major variants that became dominant. The disease ran itself out within a year or two anyway with essentially no preventantive measures taken.
We do have to rely on the deemers in a sense here, because we have to hope the vaccines are good enough. If they are almost, but not quite good enough the results will likely be catastrophic. We have two parts to the immune system, an innate immune response and a learned response.
My understanding (could be mistaken) is that the vaccines train our learned response immune system to react to a list of identifying features of the spike protein, something like ~100 characteristic features of the coronavirus. It learns to identify those features and how to react to them in a particular way. That happens during shot #1 and then during #2 we "test" that immune response on another picture of a spike protein, and that reinforces the method of action.
Once the immune system learns to react this way, that learned response may override the innate immune system. That is the immune system that protects young people and others who have mild or asymptomatic carriers of COVID-19. So in the event that the vaccines work but not quite well enough, eventually a variant can develop that isn't stopped by the vaccine. If that were to happen, then everyone who took the vaccine (such as myself) might be extremely vulnerable to that strain, since the vaccine would be ineffective and we have shut off our innate immune response to the virus, leaving us utterly defenceless.
If that were to happen, it will happen regardless of whether we social distance or mask or whatever. Obviously those measures were not robust enough to stop the virus. If we had done a real true hardcore lockdown for six weeks with every street is a ghosttown and people getting locked up for leaving the house for any reason (not saying we should have done that) it would have been the only way to maybe possibly stop the virus. We are way beyond the point of that being an option now.
Yea I don't know if he's right. I've read that and other arguments against the idea. It's still compelling though and misrespresents some of the arguments from Geert. Dunno I got my vaccine anyway, but it's something to look out for.
["While mutations to SARS-CoV-2 would be happening regardless of any human intervention, the notion that vaccination might apply evolutionary pressure toward variants that can escape current vaccines is not untenable."]
that part agrees
next bit
["Vanden Bosche argues that widespread vaccination will put evolutionary pressure on the viruses to develop adaptations — in this case changes to the spike protein that allows the virus to infect cells — in a way that will allow it to escape the vaccine’s protection. He invokes the discovery of variants currently in circulation that have altered portions of the spike protein — the target of COVID-19 vaccine — implying that these observations lead credence to his hypothesis. They do not. All of these variants were discovered prior to any widespread vaccination program."]
This is a misrepresentation of the argument. I don't think Geert's point was that vaccination led to these variants that we are already seeing. That was never the point.
["Mass vaccination programs, he claims, are “turning vaccinees into asymptomatic carriers” who can unknowingly spread these more dangerous strains by “shedding infectious variants.”"] I think is also a misrepresenation based on the things I saw.
["The production of targeted antibodies obviously creates a different response than a natural infection because “you’re producing antibodies against specific needs … therefore you have a limited targeted immune response, not the whole response that you see after an infection.” The notion that this is somehow a problem relies on the unsupported claim that a natural infection would be better equipped to kill SARS-CoV-2. “The underlying fallacy,” Omer explained, is that a natural infection is better than a vaccine. “It isn’t,” he told us. “Natural infection kills.”"]
I don't understand this. As a fit 28 year old male, my natural immune system is more than capable of handling the virus. My chances of dying from the virus are like 1/30k based on demographic comparables. Far more young, healthy men are dying to street violence than to covid in my city, which has been open since April 2020... Also don't believe the guy is peddling anything, since he doesn't have any product. That NK vaccine he talks about... he doesn't actually have one developed to sell lol. That would obviously be a red flag but AFAIK he doesn't sell anything.
Again, I don't know if this guy is right or wrong. If he is right it would be quite bad. I am taking vaccine anyway though and I'm probably more cautious than 95% of people out there in terms of my lifestyle. But I don't trust this Geert guy any more or less than an official. I'm try to do my own research and build my own models as much as possible.
This argument doesn't hold water if you review current legal guidance. Businesses can legally require proof of vaccination as they currently do. I'm not employed by local hospitals, but when I enter their ORs the hospitals can and will deny service (i.e., access) if I don't produce my vaccine record through their credentialing service of choice.
This is independent of my opinions on vaccine 'passports', particularly when the vaccines are still not fully approved.
legislation should be passed to protect people who do not want to get a vaccine. this may not be anti-vaxers but some are fine with some vaccines but not with others that are rushed that did not get full approval.
what if we find out down the line thousands have problems now because of a vaccine? you could not rule that out as a possibility especially with these new vaccines versus the old-fashioned flu shot.
there is no recourse an individual could take they cant sue the vaccine companies. if vaccines had zero risk then ok maybe we can discuss a university requiring a vaccine or business. some have not been able to work after a vaccine injury and there is nothing they can do about it. there are parents on city data who have had their children severely injured from a vaccine where the parents have to provide 24 hour care to the child. medicine should never be a one size fits all approach. These vaccines can ruin children's futures.
care to elaborate where I am wrong if not you lost this argument. what other things?
Buddy. The Spanish Flu saw restrictions that were in many cases MORE severe than the current loss of freedoms during Covid. There were similar shutdowns of businesses and churches (that went on for longer), but also fines and ARRESTS for people not complying with mask requirements. Entire cities were quarantined. World War II, same thing. HUGE disruptions of day to day life. Travel restrictions were put in place. Businesses ordered shut. Government controlling various industries to include food production. Anybody who says anything going on now is anyway unprecedented, has no idea what they are talking about.
Again, I don't know if this guy is right or wrong. If he is right it would be quite bad. I am taking vaccine anyway though and I'm probably more cautious than 95% of people out there in terms of my lifestyle. But I don't trust this Geert guy any more or less than an official. I'm try to do my own research and build my own models as much as possible.
Please don't do your own SARS-COV-2 research unless you have access to a BSL-3 facility.
Also, I know you are 'taking vaccine anyway', but your FUD campaign is straight out of the antivaxxers online manual. "If he is right it would be quite bad" is true of literally anything anyone says. If someone says, "lizard aliens are going to eat your brains" that would be bad IF IT WERE TRUE. You can't go around making decisions based on what someone has said might be true. You have to make decisions based on what is likely to be true.
And, even if there were substantial risks to this vaccine, which GIGANTIC amounts of actual research (the kind done by scientists with proper controls), not everything that is dangerous should be avoided. Oxygen, for instance, is pretty terrible for cells and can lead to a host of really bad diseases. Avoiding oxygen, you know, just to be safe, is a pretty terrible idea.
legislation should be passed to protect people who do not want to get a vaccine. this may not be anti-vaxers but some are fine with some vaccines but not with others that are rushed that did not get full approval.
what if we find out down the line thousands have problems now because of a vaccine? you could not rule that out as a possibility especially with these new vaccines versus the old-fashioned flu shot.
there is no recourse an individual could take they cant sue the vaccine companies. if vaccines had zero risk then ok maybe we can discuss a university requiring a vaccine or business. some have not been able to work after a vaccine injury and there is nothing they can do about it. there are parents on city data who have had their children severely injured from a vaccine where the parents have to provide 24 hour care to the child. medicine should never be a one size fits all approach. These vaccines can ruin children's futures.
Most risks are quantifiable. On paper, the mRNA should pose very minimal risk. To suggest otherwise is a bit fearmonger-y.
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