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The WHO is seeking a new treaty on handling future pandemics

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Re: The WHO is seeking a new treaty on handling future pandemics

#31

Post by hanniabu »

ethbr0 wrote: post #6
nynx wrote: post #2

I hope this happens. The world needs more collaboration, especially in pandemic response.

Of all the problems international cooperation could tackle, pandemics seem like they should be the easiest. Either you are dealing with one, or you aren't. Pretty stark contrast. So should make countries more comfortable ceding sovereignty, knowing it's going to be only in exceptional circumstances. Coupled with the fact that SARS-CoV-2 has proven that even the most stringent border lockdowns fail in the face of high…

> even the most stringent border lockdowns fail

Except we never had a serious lockdown. Most businesses were still open because of loose terms of what is essential or finding loopholes like bars serving food with beer so they can be considered a restaurant and other ridiculous things.

Re: The WHO is seeking a new treaty on handling future pandemics

#32

Post by akira2501 »

topspin wrote: post #25
nscalf wrote: post #12

An honest question, how do you feel about the WHO? I personally have severe distrust in them, at least the leadership. They have show they are heavily influenced by China, and that should be enough to remove them. They really botched early covid.

There is no evidence that anything has changed. Moon et al. figure enough time has passed that they may resume the grift. Let's look at some of the top line items: > They also point to conflicts over the lack of transparency and information sharing, particularly by China. Right. The problem is not the actual lack of transparency but rather "conflicts over the lack of transparency." And no, I do not allow that NPR wri…

> WHO shall decide how long the US is made to wait for vaccine.

It seems to be that the intellectual property is more pertinent than the total export volume to "poorer nations."

Re: The WHO is seeking a new treaty on handling future pandemics

#33

Post by golemotron »

tcmart14 wrote: post #26
golemotron wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Either you are dealing with one, or you aren't. Pretty stark contrast. So should make countries more comfortable ceding sovereignty, knowing it's going to be only in exceptional circumstances. Without a hard metric it's a slippery slope and governments will not cede emergency powers. That's been the history of nearly all emergency powers. Ask yourself how long this pandemic will last and whether anyone will agree u…

I feel like this argument is still in bad faith. A co-worker last year was talking about how a mask mandate was the biggest violation of freedom ever in American history. So I kindly reminded my co-worker, internment camps for Japanese-americans were less of a violation? Lincoln suspending Habeas Corpus during the civil war? Those are just two examples of many. These were all moves made by emergency powers that were.…

Emergency powers from the Patriot Act are still in effect.

The problem this pandemic (and pandemics in general) is that there is no defined end and no one seems to be willing to create one. It is either a certain number of deaths per million or zero (eradication), which would put us in smallpox territory - about two centuries.

Re: The WHO is seeking a new treaty on handling future pandemics

#34

Post by topspin »

akira2501 wrote: post #32
topspin wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no evidence that anything has changed. Moon et al. figure enough time has passed that they may resume the grift. Let's look at some of the top line items: > They also point to conflicts over the lack of transparency and information sharing, particularly by China. Right. The problem is not the actual lack of transparency but rather "conflicts over the lack of transparency." And no, I do not allow that NPR wri…

> WHO shall decide how long the US is made to wait for vaccine. It seems to be that the intellectual property is more pertinent than the total export volume to "poorer nations."

A plain reading of the report doesn't convey this. IP law is not mentioned.

Re: The WHO is seeking a new treaty on handling future pandemics

#36

Post by topkai22 »

nscalf wrote: post #12

An honest question, how do you feel about the WHO? I personally have severe distrust in them, at least the leadership. They have show they are heavily influenced by China, and that should be enough to remove them. They really botched early covid.

Flawed, but better than not having a WHO. IMO China’s influence is more because they did a great job at committing hard to diplomacy and working relationships at WHO at the exact same time the US pulled away. It turns out diplomacy and leadership matter.

In my limited experience, the WHO, like many NGOs/multi-lateral bodies, is full of intelligent, motivated people dedicated to their mission. Those people aren’t motivated by money, but are motivated by prestige and recognition. China pulled those levers well for the last several years, the US didn’t, but i don’t know of a fundamental reason why the US can’t return to its traditional place of influence if it tries.

Should the US (or China) sign a multi lateral treaty requiring it to deliver vaccines and other health resources to more vulnerable citizens of other countries ahead of some or all of its own citizens? I don’t know. Is the WHO worth having around, even in a flawed or even semi-hostile state? Yes.

Re: The WHO is seeking a new treaty on handling future pandemics

#37

Post by jacquesm »

The comments here are roughly the opposite of what a responsible group of people should agree to. Yes, the WHO isn't perfect. They made a ton of mistakes, especially in the beginning when information was scarce and the demands for information far outstripped their ability to deliver. But focusing on the mistakes and trying to play politics with the sensitive situation that they were handed after the fact certainly isn't helping, any organization that tries to deal with the initial period of outbreaks of novel diseases is going to end up making mistakes: this is a given in that situation, you, no matter how hard you would try, would not do any better.

Pandemics are - by definition - a global problem and trying to solve these with local countermeasures (aka, take care of the West and forget about the rest) isn't going to work: until such a thing is under control everywhere it might as well not be under control anywhere.

The current mess is there to a large degree because countries have been ignoring the WHO, not because they followed the WHO and their advice turned out to be nonsense.

If anything the WHO should have been more strict in their initial reading of the situation and I'm pretty sure that they have learned their lesson, but the prevention paradox is real and if they had cried 'wolf' too early they would have been abused by the same people that now claim that they messed up because they didn't react soon enough and strong enough.

From day #1 the WHO has been arguing for strong countermeasures rather than to slow-walk it to see how bad it was going to get because time lost will not be won back during a pandemic.

WHO Press briefing March 13th 2020:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AqRHH6e-y6I

The WHO did not fail us, but politicians certainly did.

Re: The WHO is seeking a new treaty on handling future pandemics

#38

Post by tablespoon »

marchingtomars wrote: post #35

Stop with the globalism Nations should handle their borders-- that's the point and root of a nation: to be born in a specifically territory.

> Stop with the globalism

> Nations should handle their borders-- that's the point and root of a nation: to be born in a specifically territory.

And obviously, there are giant classes of problems that cannot be addressed effectively (or at all) with that outlook.

For instance: a nation focused solely on its own territory will be unable to prevent a pandemic disease from affecting it if its neighbor manages to cover it up long enough for it spread across the boarder.

It's basically the externality problem from economics.

Re: The WHO is seeking a new treaty on handling future pandemics

#39

Post by jacquesm »

labster wrote: post #30
wesleywt wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A terrible take. We are fully connected to a point that national borders mean practically nothing. Only a coordinated response and open sharing of information can stop a disaster.

Climate scientist here. I have some bad news for you… Don’t expect open sharing of information to stop your disaster any time soon.

Unfortunately, the way we handled this is to me ample proof that climate change will happen and that we as humanity won't do a thing to stop it beyond some symbolic moves. In short, we're fucked. But some people will make bank while selling the rest of the world down the river.

Re: The WHO is seeking a new treaty on handling future pandemics

#40

Post by HamburgerEmoji »

hanniabu wrote: post #31
ethbr0 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of all the problems international cooperation could tackle, pandemics seem like they should be the easiest. Either you are dealing with one, or you aren't. Pretty stark contrast. So should make countries more comfortable ceding sovereignty, knowing it's going to be only in exceptional circumstances. Coupled with the fact that SARS-CoV-2 has proven that even the most stringent border lockdowns fail in the face of high…

> even the most stringent border lockdowns fail Except we never had a serious lockdown. Most businesses were still open because of loose terms of what is essential or finding loopholes like bars serving food with beer so they can be considered a restaurant and other ridiculous things.

Real lockdowns have never been tried!
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