Pfizer board member suggests end to mask, vaccine mandates • Hacker News Board

Re: Pfizer board member suggests end to mask, vaccine mandates

#451

Post by Fernicia » Wed, Jan 26, 2022, 7:31 PM UTC

hbn wrote: post #428

beams_of_light wrote: post #314

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eradication is not the goal. Making sure hospitals aren't overwhelmed with COVID patients is the goal. Catching COVID is potentially dangerous and often times results in long recovery window. Vaccination is harmless and works. The thread will never subside; this is a new virus we will have to live with for the rest of our lives - especially considering we can't seem to get everyone to do the right thing, even with go…

> Vaccination is harmless Oh please, if you want to say it's low-risk, or lower-risk than catching covid, go ahead. But don't just assert outright falsities.

It's a lot safer than other things we consider harmless.

Re: Pfizer board member suggests end to mask, vaccine mandates

#452

Post by scarmig » Wed, Jan 26, 2022, 7:33 PM UTC

jjoonathan wrote: post #444

scarmig wrote: post #388

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Something can be endemic and deadly and still something we accept the consequences of without government imposed restrictions. For example: HIV is something that is now endemic and (still) deadly. And yet we don't go around forcibly shutting down gay bathhouses, bars, and Grindr and implementing condom and prep mandates, even though they would be effective at reducing its spread. And for good reason: it'd be a massiv…

I don't have to worry about getting HIV every time I go out in public just because some jerk decided he has a god-given right to breathe viral particles into my lungs even though a simple and safe vaccine is readily available.

This is perilously close to "people who get COVID are innocent victims so forcible interventions are justified, while people who got HIV chose to do it so those same nterventions are less justified."

I agree that, for the average person, COVID is easier to contract than HIV. But by the same token, COVID is much less severe than HIV, even with modern treatment plans. It's not at core about some abstract principle about how preventing disease spread trumps all other concerns but is instead a cost benefit analysis. Keeping the country shut down perpetually is an extreme cost that we are continually incurring.

Re: Pfizer board member suggests end to mask, vaccine mandates

#453

Post by notch656a » Wed, Jan 26, 2022, 7:33 PM UTC

vanusa wrote: post #387

enchiridion wrote: post #375

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, exactly. The world is dangerous and full of risks. Freedom is literally worth sacrificing lives for. This is a fundamental founding idea of the US.

Other people's lives, you mean.

Yes exactly. When the lock down and mask mandates resulted in neuroplastic infants and toddlers not seeing as much lip and face movement during critical speech and socialization age (and in many case, daycares and schools being shut down resulting in less critical socialization), you sacrifice younger children in the hopes some others will be saved.

So we sacrifice other lives (young children) so our own adult lives can perhaps be saved.

Re: Pfizer board member suggests end to mask, vaccine mandates

#454

Post by saiya-jin » Wed, Jan 26, 2022, 7:34 PM UTC

Lammy wrote: post #397

sib301 wrote: post #363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dude go to a hospital in a populated area during this surge. My wife sat in the waiting room for 3 hours with SEVERE abdominal pain, DURING A PREGNANCY and was unable to be seen. We went home. If she’d had an ectopic pregnancy, she would probably not be here anymore.

To be fair I had exactly that same experience at the UCSF Emergency Room in 2017. Four hours in the waiting room, and then the only bed they could give me was against one wall of a busy hallway.

Yes its very common even in richest places. Case point #2 - Geneva, Switzerland has the biggest public hospital in whole country (HUG). They employ around 10k personnel overall, and Geneva is relatively small city (they call it the smallest metropole for a reason). There is no shortage of money or high tech equipment.

But if you came pre-covid during say weekend night and you were not clearly about to die, 10+h waiting time in emergency was not unheard of (wife was serving there for some time as doctor, those folks deserve some proper respect). Simply overwhelmed, not enough staff comprised mostly by junior doctors. Now they are properly good in diagnosing whether your excruciating pain is life-threatening or not, but it must suck big time to be on patient's side.

This is by far the biggest emergency in whole canton. Any private clinic or smaller medical centre will send serious cases straight there.

Its not something discussed frequently but that's just how things are, in one of the richest and well-organized countries in whole world. Don't expect much better experience if you have bad luck with timing.

Re: Pfizer board member suggests end to mask, vaccine mandates

#455

Post by deegles » Wed, Jan 26, 2022, 7:34 PM UTC

tzs wrote: post #30

Something from the NYT mailing list yesterday: > The Covid vaccines are remarkably effective at preventing serious illness. If you’re vaccinated, your chances of getting severely sick are extremely low. Even among people 65 and older, the combination of the vaccines’ effectiveness and the Omicron variant’s relative mildness means that Covid now appears to present less danger than a normal flu. > For the unvaccinated,…

> With COVID becoming endemic everyone is going to get antibodies

Vaccines provide better protection than infection, just to be clear. It's not true that you're safe because of a previous infection.

See: https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2021/s0806-vaccination-pr...

Re: Pfizer board member suggests end to mask, vaccine mandates

#456

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Jan 26, 2022, 7:34 PM UTC

jjoonathan wrote: post #444

scarmig wrote: post #388

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Something can be endemic and deadly and still something we accept the consequences of without government imposed restrictions. For example: HIV is something that is now endemic and (still) deadly. And yet we don't go around forcibly shutting down gay bathhouses, bars, and Grindr and implementing condom and prep mandates, even though they would be effective at reducing its spread. And for good reason: it'd be a massiv…

I don't have to worry about getting HIV every time I go out in public just because some jerk decided he has a god-given right to breathe viral particles into my lungs even though a simple and safe vaccine is readily available.

[deleted]

Re: Pfizer board member suggests end to mask, vaccine mandates

#457

Post by theandrewbailey » Wed, Jan 26, 2022, 7:35 PM UTC

e40 wrote: post #366

theandrewbailey wrote: post #313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'd say the answer to that should be determined by the hospital capacity. If a region has sufficient hospital capacity that it would not be overwhelmed by the increase in COVID cases among the unvaccinated go ahead and lift most restrictions. Having anyone's freedoms dependent on available hospital capacity is a terrible way to run a society. Note that these freedoms were debated and won in an era where medicine wa…

I hate this casting of the issue as "freedom". It's absurd. My "freedom" to live because I have a medical issue but cannot get treatment will be severely impacted if hospitals are overrun with patients and worn out workers. See, we can both play the "freedom" game.

> See, we can both play the "freedom" game.

The doctors and nurses you're asking treatment from are people who deserve freedom and work-life balance, too. Many have been fed up and are quitting. Would you support the government forcing them to continue working? Would you force young people to be doctors and nurses?

Re: Pfizer board member suggests end to mask, vaccine mandates

#458

Post by ggy5567 » Wed, Jan 26, 2022, 7:35 PM UTC

xadhominemx wrote: post #236

argvargc wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

...of lockdowns?

COVID denialists often attribute excess deaths to lockdowns as opposed to undercounting of deaths from COVID. I was just preempting that line by pointing out Australia had severe lockdowns but negative excess deaths.

As I recall the basis of the argument against lockdowns (which yes was made by legitimate epidemeologists before covid made everything so politicized and tribal) is that the disease eventually comes right back and infects everyone once the lockdown ends. I do think there is a good argument about allowing vaccines to be developed and delivered though. But benefits like preventing hospitals from being overwhelmed were believed to already be achievable with social distancing alone. So one must be careful to not give to much credit to the lockdowns alone.

As for excess deaths, it presumably depends on how well the country can endure the self-inflicted downsides (such as a recession) that comes with it. Countries where it causes severe problems probably are the very ones who didn't have the political will to maintain the lockdowns, leading to some biased conclusions. We also have lots of other issues caused by covid response such as shortages and spiking prices all over. Being outright dodged by pointing blame at some indermediate actor like "corporate supply chains" or "hoarders" or whatever.

The point is there are arguments that can be made on all sides. No need to insult and dismiss people.

Re: Pfizer board member suggests end to mask, vaccine mandates

#459

Post by theandrewbailey » Wed, Jan 26, 2022, 7:38 PM UTC

notch656a wrote: post #453

vanusa wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Other people's lives, you mean.

Yes exactly. When the lock down and mask mandates resulted in neuroplastic infants and toddlers not seeing as much lip and face movement during critical speech and socialization age (and in many case, daycares and schools being shut down resulting in less critical socialization), you sacrifice younger children in the hopes some others will be saved. So we sacrifice other lives (young children) so our own adult lives…

Also consider that young children are the demographic least affected (symptoms and death) by COVID. It was obvious a few months in, but these debilitating policies continued.

Re: Pfizer board member suggests end to mask, vaccine mandates

#460

Post by throwaway554349 » Wed, Jan 26, 2022, 7:38 PM UTC

tzs wrote: post #30

Something from the NYT mailing list yesterday: > The Covid vaccines are remarkably effective at preventing serious illness. If you’re vaccinated, your chances of getting severely sick are extremely low. Even among people 65 and older, the combination of the vaccines’ effectiveness and the Omicron variant’s relative mildness means that Covid now appears to present less danger than a normal flu. > For the unvaccinated,…

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