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We could have universal Covid vaccines soon

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Re: We could have universal Covid vaccines soon

#271

Post by Robotbeat »

ars wrote: post #212
s-lambert wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When a supermarket is only a 10 minute walk away (20 minutes round trip), you just go more often and carry smaller amounts. Even if you suddenly needed 30 bottles of seltzer in the same day, you can just walk there and back twice.

If the supermarket is only 0.5 miles away, it's going to be quite small. Normal sized supermarkets are in the range of 5 or so miles apart. I am not interested in living in a place where tiny stores are my only option. Also, why would I want to waste my time walking 20 minutes multiple times a week, plus time in the store? That sounds dreadful, why would you want that?

Also, there’s more distribution costs and more distribution driving for numerous small stores Vs big stores.

Re: We could have universal Covid vaccines soon

#272

Post by jameshart »

Ekaros wrote: post #224
jameshart wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The previous president suggested some sort of experimental bleach-based antiviral treatment regime was under development. And you want to ding this one for trying to persuade people to take a vaccine?

Maybe these types of lies spread by the fascist totalitarian anti-freedom vaccine promoting crowd is part of the problem.

‘promoting general public health through sensible preventive medical programs’ is not generally listed among the top evils committed by totalitarian regimes.

Re: We could have universal Covid vaccines soon

#273

Post by jameshart »

xyzzy123 wrote: post #201
jameshart wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Vaccines are not only supposed to benefit the recipient. Vaccination is a public health program . If vaccinating under fives reduces the risk to preschool carers and enables us to maintain higher preschool capacity then that's a public benefit that has nothing. to do with whether it affects the individual outcomes of five year olds who contract covid.

Right but it doesn't prevent infection or transmission for more than a couple of months. > If vaccinating under fives reduces the risk to preschool carers and enables us to maintain higher preschool capacity I agree, but this is also not known. Any broader public health benefits are theoretical at this point. They don't seem to have been measured or even modelled.

Vaccination (and masking and distancing) are the only things we really can try to reduce transmission.

Re: We could have universal Covid vaccines soon

#274

Post by jameshart »

apostacy wrote: post #193
jameshart wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What, with respect to vaccines, specifically, would you say has undermined trust? Was there some massive scandalous plague of side effects caused by a carelessly approved vaccine that I missed?

So much of the handling of this pandemic has completely shattered my trust in our medical and scientific institutions. The debate about the actual medical benefits of the vaccine are almost irrelevant at this point.

Specifically, what ‘shattered’ that trust?

What did you need to see from those in power that would have maintained or built that trust?

Re: We could have universal Covid vaccines soon

#275

Post by ifyoubuildit »

jameshart wrote: post #265
josephcsible wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This gives me Omelas vibes. Is it really a good idea to increase risk of harm (via side effects) in our youngest for "the greater good"?

We’re talking about a vaccine. The risks involved are generally very small, and the benefits of a successful vaccination program are massive. On the other hand we occasionally lose an entire classroom of kids to a mass shooting, but a significant part of society tells us that we can’t do anything to restrict gun ownership to reduce that risk because apparently the ‘greater good’ of mass unrestricted gun ownership is…

> We’re talking about a vaccine.

We're talking about interfacing with an incredibly varied and complicated system in the human body. Just because we have implementations that have worked spledidly in the past, doesnt mean that every new instance of the class "vaccine" should immediately get to ride on the coattails of the others.

Maybe these vaccines are a miracle as a lot of people believe. But this mindset of "it carries the same name as these other products, so it must be fine" is an incredibly vulnerable one to have for future drug products.

Re: We could have universal Covid vaccines soon

#276

Post by robhunter »

jameshart wrote: post #274
apostacy wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So much of the handling of this pandemic has completely shattered my trust in our medical and scientific institutions. The debate about the actual medical benefits of the vaccine are almost irrelevant at this point.

Specifically, what ‘shattered’ that trust? What did you need to see from those in power that would have maintained or built that trust?

Differentiating between a hypotheses and facts

Having transparent, open, equity-based discussions about costs & benefits

Frequent, honest, humble admitting of mistakes

Re: We could have universal Covid vaccines soon

#277

Post by chii »

akkawwakka wrote: post #187
ars wrote: post #106

This is the wrong discussion - what's needed is a vaccine that actually lasts for more than 6 months before immunity fades. I remember reading very early in COVID how experts said finding a vaccine would be very difficult because we've never been able to generate long lasting immunity to corona viruses. And they were hoping COVID would be different. Turns out - it's not different.

We are preventing development of serious disease with the vaccine. At the end of the day, that’s what should count.

> At the end of the day, that’s what should count.

no, that's just the most that could be achieved. The ideal, which is long lasting immunity, is not quite achievable atm (it seems).

I'd definitely accept reduction in severity, but would hope for a life long immunity.

Re: We could have universal Covid vaccines soon

#278

Post by ifyoubuildit »

jameshart wrote: post #274
apostacy wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So much of the handling of this pandemic has completely shattered my trust in our medical and scientific institutions. The debate about the actual medical benefits of the vaccine are almost irrelevant at this point.

Specifically, what ‘shattered’ that trust? What did you need to see from those in power that would have maintained or built that trust?

Not op, but I recovered from covid shortly before vaccines were available, and then opted not to get the shots based on available data on reinfections.

That decision has only seemed better supported as time has gone on, yet I still have to desperately avoid the topic in polite conversation if I don't want your average person to make all sorts of incorrect assumptions about me. There was also the risk to my livelihood from employer mandates.

I would have to see them go back and say "hey, that wasn't a deplorable decision, and we're sorry for encouraging everyone to think terrible things about you for making it."

I understand the noble lie argument, it just means that now I can't feel comfortable taking anything that comes out of public health at face value.

Re: We could have universal Covid vaccines soon

#279

Post by rayiner »

wizofaus wrote: post #241
rayiner wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What I think doesn't matter. From my perspective, about 50% of the United States is on a totally different wavelength, they seem to casually take insane risks WRT covid, and inexplicably focus on hating minorities (which I just don't get, why hate people who haven't done anything to you, when you could just ignore them instead?). Do you really believe that’s what drives people? You don’t think maybe it’s that these…

> Do you really believe that’s what drives people? I've seen plenty examples of entrenched prejudice in people against others that can't possibly have any negative effect on their own existence. And in many cases it's very hard not to see it as irrational "hatred" where, as per GP's point, even just pretending the objects of their hatred simply don't exist would surely be a better response. Presumably hatred for enti…

> I've seen plenty examples of entrenched prejudice in people against others that can't possibly have any negative effect on their own existence.

Sure. But OP referred to "50% of the United States ... hating minorities." As a card-carrying minority who lives in a Trump-voting precinct, that's bollocks.

> BTW, I'm pretty sure most people (on HN at least) can distinguish between those that object to immigration on racist grounds vs those who have genuine concerns about how to integrate others from different cultures or with difficult backgrounds.

I think a great many of folks, especially on HN, cannot. I think many highly educated Americans who work in global industries have adopted a radical new ideology that treats multiculturalism as a fundamental pillar of society. I talk to people in that group who think the Japanese are "racist" for not wanting immigration. They don't have the intellectual framework or vocabulary to understand all the other kinds of conflicts--cultural, economic, political--that exist between groups.

I think it's much easier for me as a foreigner to understand how "50% of the United States" is responding to prevailing trends, because I just imagine what your average Bangladeshi person would do in the same situation.

> And the latter spend their time researching/implementing solutions, or personally doing what they can to help newcomers settle in while trying to remain realistic about the rate that can be successfully sustained.

Many in that "50% of the United States" that supposedly "hates minorities" do exactly that: https://www.thegazette.com/government-politics/ernst-sees-af....

But nothing requires people to support any level of immigration. Even successfully-integrated immigrants change the country. My family, which are landed elites from Bangladesh, has starkly different values from my wife's family, who are pioneers that settled the west coast during the wagon train era. And we vote based on those differences. We are the immigrants who changed Virginia from being more of a southern state to its modern incarnation as a destination for highly educated elites. In my view, nobody whose family is already in America has any obligation to welcome those changes. They're entitled to vote against cultural change, or against reduced political power for their cultural groups. That's just Democracy at work.

Re: We could have universal Covid vaccines soon

#280

Post by peteradio »

jameshart wrote: post #269
osigurdson wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For individual patients, sure, but when dealing with populations a more rigorous statistical analysis is needed.

Okay. And what specific number of quality adjusted life years would a vaccination program need to promise to save across the globe before you personally are willing to take it?

> quality adjusted life years

Do you feel comfortable acknowledging that this metric in isolation could result in trading years across age demographics? To what degree does it matter if we take 1 year of life from a child and give it to a middle aged person, doing exactly that would be fairly neutral according to QALY.

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