Because it's a terrible policy prescription. If natural immunity is acceptable, what proportion of the unvaccinated-uninfected population will just take the risk? Half? More? Millions of people will just (continue to) take the risk, get sick, go to hospital, and die (in decreasing proportions), incurring substantial personal and social costs along the way. Accepting only vaccination as evidence of protection reduces…
Why doesn’t natural immunity count in the US?
791–800 of 1001 posts
Re: Why doesn’t natural immunity count in the US?
#792Because it's a terrible policy prescription. If natural immunity is acceptable, what proportion of the unvaccinated-uninfected population will just take the risk? Half? More? Millions of people will just (continue to) take the risk, get sick, go to hospital, and die (in decreasing proportions), incurring substantial personal and social costs along the way. Accepting only vaccination as evidence of protection reduces…
It seems like a policy of forcing people with natural immunity to be vaccinated could have negative externalities if there are other countries in the world that don't have enough vaccines.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/sep/10/boys-more-at-r...
And it's also unethical to force it onto someone who has natural immunity, since their natural immunity is already on par or better than vaccination. So what's the point?
https://www.science.org/content/article/having-sars-cov-2-on...
Re: Why doesn’t natural immunity count in the US?
#793It seems like we have some data — hospitalizations and deaths of vaccinated — but even that isn’t clearly and consistently reported anywhere that I’ve seen (e.g. try finding a chart in [1]).
We need to do better at tracking and reporting on this data, so that we can finally have answers to a lot of questions around effectiveness of vaccines and natural immunity from prior infection.
[1] https://www.google.com/search?q=covid+hospitalizations+and+d...
Re: Why doesn’t natural immunity count in the US?
#794Because it's a terrible policy prescription. If natural immunity is acceptable, what proportion of the unvaccinated-uninfected population will just take the risk? Half? More? Millions of people will just (continue to) take the risk, get sick, go to hospital, and die (in decreasing proportions), incurring substantial personal and social costs along the way. Accepting only vaccination as evidence of protection reduces…
To reply as the devils advocate to this comment, what is the tolerance to social costs that society is willing to bear? Also why would one segment of society have to do something that it doesn't want e.g. not bear risk if they want to? Should we tell people to get their BMI under 25 too? Overweight and obesity are going to cost much more in increased healthcare costs than COVID will in the coming decades (pls prove m…
Let us put the gays to the camps, they impose external costs to the healthcare system too (but we won't, because they are a holy symbol for these people).
Re: Why doesn’t natural immunity count in the US?
#795Earlier quoted context omitted.
It does because you place disproportionate strain on the healthcare system, which limits its accessibility to others. There also is a 100% successful method for losing weight, it's just that people can't or choose not to follow it, but we could mandate it and force them to. For their own good and the good of the healthcare system. (We probably should not mandate that or any other drug or medical treatment)
No it doesn’t. People have been smoking, drinking and being fat for decades now and we haven’t had a crisis or a lack of beds for the rest of the public.
Re: Why doesn’t natural immunity count in the US?
#796Earlier quoted context omitted.
>Should we tell people to get their BMI under 25 too? >What about drinking and smoking? There's a lot of investment in trying to fix these problems already, or at least offset the costs. For example, there are "sin taxes" for things like cigarettes and alcohol, which means smokers and drinkers are paying disproportionately more taxes than those that don't. You could argue that overweight folks are also paying disprop…
Actually no, we don’t even need a shot to lose weight you just eat less. Also the government is actively promoting obesity by subsidizing cheap unhealthy food via agriculture subsidies like hfcs and soybeans. So while there are some who have actually spoken out against obesity like Michelle Obama, most are silent as the issue is kinda politically inconvenient for both parties on a macro scale. It’s disgusting and why…
Government cannot and should not regulate every aspect of our lives. Wanna drink a bottle of whiskey and kill yourself? Individual responsibility.
Wanna get fat slogging sugar all day without self control? Individual responsibility.
Individual responsibility seems to never be part of the conversation.
Re: Why doesn’t natural immunity count in the US?
#797Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Because it's a terrible policy prescription. If natural immunity is acceptable, what proportion of the unvaccinated-uninfected population will just take the risk? Half? More? What we know : We know that vaccines are of great value for high risk populations. We know that vaccines are contraindicated for a number of patients and have some pretty severe side effects for those with allergies. We know that the vaccines…
>We also know that the Covid vaccines are not immunizing, and a large amount of virus can be passed on from vaccinated, to the unvaccinated. I'm flagging this as dubious. Everything I've seen points to smaller viral load and shorter durations for breakthroughs.
> “We don’t yet know how much transmission can happen from people who get COVID-19 after being vaccinated — for example, they may have high levels of virus for shorter periods of time,” says Prof. Walker.
In the big scheme of things, the issue is not point-in-time Sept 2021. The issue is the long term evolution of the virus. We know as a fact that the rise of Delta caught the vaccine program flatfooted and was the last nail in the coffin of the ZeroCovid idea. We have an unusual Summer-time epidemic spike. We've never deployed single-protein mRNA vaccines at scale, neither in animal nor in human populations. There are legitimate concerns (voiced even by Pfizer CEO) that the virus is likely (his word, not mine) to evade vaccine protection. At which point all the 'viral load is smaller / shorter for breakthroughs' logic goes out the window.
It gives me no pleasure to write the above. I secretly hope I'm wrong / under-informed. I wish that mRNA vaccines were a magic wand to wave covid away. But no amount of wishful thinking will make it so. I find the certitude of '(force) vaccinate everybody, is an absolute positive good in all possible scenarios' hard to square with the actual fragile situation we find ourselves in.
https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/delta-infection-un...
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.31.21261387v...
https://www.insider.com/pfizer-ceo-vaccine-resistant-coronav...
Re: Why doesn’t natural immunity count in the US?
#798Earlier quoted context omitted.
>One takes a couple minutes and the other is something requiring an hour or more of dedicated time per day for potentially years (or a whole lifetime! Nope. You don't have to dedicate time to exercising to lose weight, you can just eat less.
Also not trivial, given the legitimate hunger and compulsion someone with an overeating problem may have after suffering with it for years. So yes, not an explicit time dedication, but you’re being pedantic at that point and the practical reality that a vaccine is a minimal inconvenience is reasonably unavoidable. Obviously exceptions exist, which is what medical exceptions are for etc etc.
I hope it is obvious I don't actually feel this way toward overweight people -- it's hateful, discriminatory, divisive, bullying, and it goes against everything I believe about freedom people should have to live their lives.
And yet being overweight is a detriment to health. And it places additional burden on the healthcare system. So I think it is a good analogy to use, if there was an equally effective one that was less shocking, I would gladly use that instead.
See, I can see the "perfect" society where everything is done for "the greater good". Where the ruling class and their alleged experts hand down edicts by which we much live. Everything is mandated accordingly. Nobody may question the mandates or the rulers, lest they be bullied and branded grandma killers / fascists / baby killers / etc. And I can see how yes you might micro optimize this society by forcing people to take vaccines. And by forcing overweight people to lose weight. I don't deny that maybe some people could be "saved" if we had all these mandates. That is not the society I value or want to live in though.
And I think that's a very underhanded bullying argument to coerce people into giving up their freedom or having medical treatment they don't want, to suggest that they are responsible for killing others because of choices like this. Because there are hundreds of ways we could all change our choices and indirectly save people,it does not always mean we are responsible for them if we don't.
I mean, you take it to the limit and you might well say elderly have passed their used by date, no longer contribute to the greater good, and are increasingly a burden on the healthcare system, so let's turf them out. Every hospital bed they selfishly take up is stealing the life of a sick child who could not be admitted due to the shortage. Or that you are personally responsible for the death of anyone around the world who dies of hunger so long as you have not donated every last penny of your income beyond what you require to barely survive on in a tent.
My position is that actually the most dangerous thing facing our society and our children and their children is authoritarianism and the unaccountable and unchecked expansion of power of the ruling class over our lives. Unimaginably more dangerous than covid-19. And I think mine is quite a reasonable position to take.
So if someone can be bullied and told they are responsible for killing grandparents and responsible for continuing lockdowns for not wanting to take the vaccine then fine, and we can say with similar intellectual honesty that those bullies calling for mandates are responsible for the next Stalin.
EDIT: And one last thing, it's not "those hateful others", aka your fellow citizens, who are responsible for the breakdown of trust in authority and their "experts". It is entirely the fault of the ruling class. Their greed, lies, lust for power and willingness to divide has caused this. You really wonder why people might not have complete blind trust in the politicians, journalists and other self-proclaimed experts who told them we had to invade Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, we had to destroy Syria and Libya, etc.? That it was for their best interest? Remember that? And then they stole their money and sent their sons and daughters away to die? And then they laughed all the way to the bank and did it again.
Re: Why doesn’t natural immunity count in the US?
#799Earlier quoted context omitted.
It should count. But why test for it and why expect proof? If someone is concerned, get vaccinated if you don't have antibodies already. And wear a mask when cases go above N in your area. Problem solved. What use is there to build systems of control that will turn into more surveillance and eventual enslavement?
That's a little over the top. Kids get vaccinated to go to schools. We aren't in chains.
Just don't try to move too much and you won't even feel 'em.
Re: Why doesn’t natural immunity count in the US?
#800Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Let's say, hypothetically, there existed a free shot which would immediately make its recipient a perfectly lean 20 BMI and grants all the benefits of health and exercise without the work I would be very skeptical and wonder what the downside is
I would be very skeptical and wonder what the downside is I would too, but this is the same thing that anti-vaxxers are saying about the COVID vaccine