Coronavirus

[Kin]

It's a hard question to answer, because I think it falls into the same camp as terrorism.  How do you communicate with someone who believes in something so radically different than you that both parties think the other side is insane?

You don't. Or, at least, communicating with them isn't the priority. The priority is coming up with sensible laws that protect people from other people's bad decisions and make it punitive to act in a manner that's harmful to society.

If a whole group of people tomorrow decided they didn't believe in Physics and, as a result, they didn't need to obey the speed limit when driving we wouldn't worry about how to convince them about gravity and how it works, we'd enforce the laws we have on the books and, if necessary, enact harsher ones. They'd get tickets, lose their license and go to prison if they hurt anyone.

Mandatory vaccinations is probably a path you can't go down but what you can do is make it so that choosing to not be vaccinated has real consequences. You don't have the right to go to a movie theatre or concert or even a grocery store if your doing so negatively affects public health.

It's the old legal concept of your right to swing your arms ends at my face.

 

[CarltonTheBear]

https://twitter.com/torontostar/status/1425760237290762243

Yes quite the dilemma indeed, hmmmm

 

[herman]

https://twitter.com/audraplewis/status/1423627306589884420
What?s it like to live in an echo chamber of cognitive dissonance

 

[CarltonTheBear]

https://twitter.com/ronfilipkowski/status/1428774353534078979

 

[herman]

https://twitter.com/ashtonpittman/status/1428841380126855172
Not going to take the vaccine because who knows what?s in it!

 

[L K]

https://twitter.com/ashtonpittman/status/1428841380126855172
Not going to take the vaccine because who knows what?s in it!

Yep this is where I lost my interest in the ?I?m just waiting it out crowd?.  No they weren?t.  They jump at all kinds of questionable bullshit.  Hydroxychloroquin, Ivermectin, Metformin (but won?t take it for diabetes) and a half dozen other nonsense ?it treats cytokine storm? crap

 

[Bender]

https://twitter.com/ashtonpittman/status/1428841380126855172
Not going to take the vaccine because who knows what?s in it!

Yep this is where I lost my interest in the ?I?m just waiting it out crowd?.  No they weren?t.  They jump at all kinds of questionable bull#$#%.  Hydroxychloroquin, Ivermectin, Metformin (but won?t take it for diabetes) and a half dozen other nonsense ?it treats cytokine storm? crap

I really don't understand the rationale in taking a drug (any drug, apparently) but not taking a vaccine.

 

[herman]

https://twitter.com/richard680news/status/1429051362919211012
Willfully letting kids spread Covid and die and being forced to cut back drinking water to own the libs

 

[L K]

The FDA is going to formally approve the mRNA vaccine on Monday.  Prepare for the ?it?s not an approved vaccine? crowd to shift to some other bullshit argument to claim it?s not safe?.while drinking hyper concentrated equine ivermectin because they are morons

 

[Chris]

https://twitter.com/ashtonpittman/status/1428841380126855172
Not going to take the vaccine because who knows what?s in it!

Yep this is where I lost my interest in the ?I?m just waiting it out crowd?.  No they weren?t.  They jump at all kinds of questionable bull#$#%.  Hydroxychloroquin, Ivermectin, Metformin (but won?t take it for diabetes) and a half dozen other nonsense ?it treats cytokine storm? crap

I really don't understand the rationale in taking a drug (any drug, apparently) but not taking a vaccine.

Well, let's see...ivermectin has been used in humans (and animals) for over 30 years, has an amazing safety record, is considered an essential medicine by the WHO. It shows anti-viral properties in vitro. Human studies for covid have shown positive benefits in almost every study. Yes, the studies are generally small and not RCT. I know quite a number of people who have been using it for months for covid prophylaxis (many use the horse paste) with no ill effects. I also know people who've gotten severe cases of covid despite using it.

The vaccines...new technology that was rushed into use via EUA, the first in-human tests started a little over a year ago so there is no long term safety data, lots of people have had serious adverse events, vaccines seem to be far less effective against covid infection than expected (and decreasing over time).

Yeah...I can easily see why some people opt out of the vaccines.

 

[Kin]

Yikes.

 

[Darryl]

Let's not start pushing antivaxx talking points

 

[bustaheims]

If we were talking about doctors prescribing ivermectin over the vaccine, that would be one thing, but self medicating with concentrations of a drug meant for animals is just pure stupidity.

mRNA technology isn?t new, either. It?s been around for more than 30 years. This is just the first human mRNA vaccine.

 

[Chris]

If we were talking about doctors prescribing ivermectin over the vaccine, that would be one thing, but self medicating with concentrations of a drug meant for animals is just pure stupidity.

mRNA technology isn?t new, either. It?s been around for more than 30 years. This is just the first human mRNA vaccine.

So first off, I'm not advocating for the use of horse paste. Just saying I know a bunch of people who've been using it without problems. If you take a whole tube - well, that's pretty stupid.

Second, many doctors are prescribing ivermectin. I have a prescription for it in case I wind up with covid. However, some pharmacies are refusing to fill legitimate prescriptions which is absolutely ridiculous.

As for mRNA - yeah, that's kind of the point...we've never successfully used mRNA vaccines in humans before. Lots of things seem like good ideas and don't turn out to be. Time will tell.

 

[herman]

Your body uses mRNA on a daily basis, literally constantly.

Anti-parasitics are not anti-virals whether it is safe for consumption or not.

 

[Bender]

If we were talking about doctors prescribing ivermectin over the vaccine, that would be one thing, but self medicating with concentrations of a drug meant for animals is just pure stupidity.

mRNA technology isn?t new, either. It?s been around for more than 30 years. This is just the first human mRNA vaccine.

So first off, I'm not advocating for the use of horse paste. Just saying I know a bunch of people who've been using it without problems. If you take a whole tube - well, that's pretty stupid.

Second, many doctors are prescribing ivermectin. I have a prescription for it in case I wind up with covid. However, some pharmacies are refusing to fill legitimate prescriptions which is absolutely ridiculous.

As for mRNA - yeah, that's kind of the point...we've never successfully used mRNA vaccines in humans before. Lots of things seem like good ideas and don't turn out to be. Time will tell.

The use the term "doctors" without quantification is kind of meaningless. Scientists deny global warming exists, but it's 5% of scientists, therefore it is not even remotely equal weighting.

Secondly, Ivermectin has not proven much so far in combating a very specific and new disease. Why would a drug used to treat parasitic worms be useful against a virus? Previously it was Hydroxychloroquine, which is used to treat Malaria and not covid because it wasn't designed for that purpose.

My point is people assume there are no downsides or side effects with taking drugs in general (and in this case drugs not even designed to fight covid) but there obviously are. Anyone who has taken something like prednisone knows this very well. Assuming drugs have a better safety profile for a brand new disease that they weren't designed to fight vs. a rigorously studied vaccine, which already shows wide scale benefit, just doesn't square with me if you're worried about bodily harm. It's just bad logic.

As well, the newness of something isn't necessarily an argument for or against something's use, what should matter are results and by far the best method to preventing covid, bad cases of covid and transmission of covid are vaccines that have shown to be surprisingly good considering they are first gen iterations. If you were given any other vaccine with a high efficacy profile you wouldn't have asked the doctor "how quickly was this vaccine developed?" before covid simply because the development of these vaccines were so public. The timeline between the Salk Polio vaccine was 3 years between 1952. The first test was in 1953 and was deployed widely in 1955. Considering that's the 1950s and where technology was back then that's a pretty damn quick turnaround, and if given the choice I don't think the vast majority of people would rather get polio than the vaccine.

I'm really not interested in getting into the weeds any further here because as I said with climate change, there is always someone providing evidence to prove one's point, but the evidence for the efficacy of the vaccines is beyond dispute at this point, especially considering Canada was nowhere near being the first population to have wide access if we're concerned with safety. And at any rate, the most frail in our society are being protected by the vaccines - to me this is a pretty good proxy for the vast majority of adults.

 

[Andy007]

Great post, Bender.

I'm honestly shocked by how many people I know who are rampantly against the vaccine. And that transcends political boundaries. Interesting times we live in.

 

[OldTimeHockey]

Where my issues lie are with the "my body, my choice" crowd.
In principal I fully agree.
Want to get piercings in your forehead??? Go ahead, "your body, your choice"
Want to place your head in that pizza oven to give you a nice even "all over tan"? Go ahead, "your body, your choice"
Want to refuse the vaccine? Go ahead, but remember it's not just your body that's effected. It's my toddler that can't get the vaccine yet that's effected. It's my neighbour who's had adverse allergic reaction to ingredients in the vaccine. It's my elderly parent who may need attention in the ICU that isn't readily available. It's a whole host of people that your choice is effecting. So when you're eating up a ventilator in the hospital remember the person outside that hospital that needs the ventilator now and can't access it because you made a "my body, my choice" decision.

 

[Heroic Shrimp]

The answers to the questions, "what is the percentage of physicians who have chosen to be vaccinated?" and "what is the percentage of physicians taking parasitic roundworm medication prophylactically?" should tell you a lot.

 

[Kin]

Where my issues lie are with the "my body, my choice" crowd.
In principal I fully agree.
Want to get piercings in your forehead??? Go ahead, "your body, your choice"
Want to place your head in that pizza oven to give you a nice even "all over tan"? Go ahead, "your body, your choice"
Want to refuse the vaccine? Go ahead, but remember it's not just your body that's effected. It's my toddler that can't get the vaccine yet that's effected. It's my neighbour who's had adverse allergic reaction to ingredients in the vaccine. It's my elderly parent who may need attention in the ICU that isn't readily available. It's a whole host of people that your choice is effecting. So when you're eating up a ventilator in the hospital remember the person outside that hospital that needs the ventilator now and can't access it because you made a "my body, my choice" decision.

It's not even just that, although obviously the ICU stuff is the most pressing and crucial. My doctor's office just sent an email to all of their patients saying that because of all of the disruptions to hospitals for even non-urgent care there's a huge backlog being created of people needing treatment who are going to have to wait. People are walking around with surgeries they need done who are going to be waiting months or years for the backlog to get cleared.

And to give an idea of the how that reverberates all the way around society the context of the email was "We understand the wait is making you frustrated but we will no longer tolerate the verbal abuse of our staff." People prolonging the pandemic by not getting vaccinated are doing all sorts of unseen damage on top of the realities you're talking about with regards to urgent medical care.