What Do You Think Today?

[I'm Murrin]

...because everybody with half a brain can see that to do so would not simply 'damage our economy further' - it would blast it back into the frikkin' medieval; we'd all be spinning wool on looms and living on deer poached off the King's estates before it recovered.

(Because the government isn't willing to give the support necessary to to workers and businesses that would allow us to get through such a thing without massive economic harm, something the government is in fact absolutely capable of doing if it chose to.)

[peter]

I am not an anti-vaxxer. I think anyone who does not vaccinate their children with the MMR vaccine is likely being very unwise. I think Bill and Melinda Gates are not trying to take over the world but are simply trying, with their Health Foundation, to give a little back. I think that vaccine programs n both the developed and even more importantly the third world, have saved countless lives and avoided suffering on a scale almost too huge to contemplate.

But I notice that there is a trend toward labeling those of us who, I think, have a reasonable scepticism about the speed with which a Covid vaccine is being rushed to market, amongst this group, and I don't like it.

Under normal circumstances, before vaccines or drugs reach the point of mass rollout, they undergo rigorous trials for safety that take years to complete and cover every angle of the potential consequence of their administration. They undergo peer review in the countless journals with which the scientific/medical community communicates with itself, the rollout itself is staggered in order to detect any lingering potential defect that may have slipped through the net, and finally, after many moons in development, they are released onto the general market.

In the case of Covid, due to the borderline hysteria surrounding the virus and the ensuing hyperbolic response of Governments the world over, these carefully tried and tested practices have been thrown to the winds and (scenting profits of epic proportions to be made - the incentive for all the activities they carry out - pharmaceutical companies the world over have rushed, together with the universities, to enter a race to be the first to get a product to market that scrapes or ducks it's way past the legislation that usually ensures compliance with the safety protocols, and following on from this, the safety of those to whom the product is administered.

Under these circumstances is it unreasonable to employ a healthy degree of scepticism about any product that is by suave marketing -and with jittery Governments wiping their near-panicked brows at being able to offer this fig-leaf of a safety net to their demanding publics - thrust before us in the near future. I don't think so and I resent being lumped in with the tub-thumping "God will save us" anti-vaxxer groupings because I do so.

[Avatar]

Wasn't aware this was happening...seems a clear distinction between being against a vaccine and saying that it will take a long time, and if it doesn't, it's possibly medically suspect or dubious.

Was surprised to see the UK protest about masks though...tend to think of you bunch as more sensible than that in general, although I suppose there are always some.

There has been plenty of protesting here about the sometimes draconian and not always rational measures in place here, but not one word of complaint about the masks (which everybody technically has to wear).

Interestingly, the onus of enforcement of this is on business owners etc. who can be liable for fines if they permit anybody without a mask into their establishment, onto transport, and so forth.

Very strange. But no protests about the masks.

--A

[Kizza]

I think there has to be a better design of face mask. Wearing spectacles a lot, I fog up nearly all the time. I saw a woman wearing a g-string as a mask (no not on the porn channel) and it occurred to me that maybe the things would go better tied under my armpits!

Anyway, the vaccine (not that there is one) will prove to be a money spinner for the tenacious insiders. The fact it is being talked about may signal it is not that far away? I hope so. I am sure that there are dirty games afoot in competitions for top spot right now.
I can understand the feelings of umbrage and disenfranchised bewilderment, but i could complain about the shape of face masks a little more too. I also hope that they get it right..... the vaccine I mean.

Australia is officially in its deepest deficit crisis since WW2. My hands just got cold, and now I am thinking about the guitar in the shed...

Hope you are all well.

As Dolores Umbridge said, "Things at Hogwarts are far worse than I feared."

[Avatar]

I think you can mitigate that with the ones with little filtered vents. Otherwise, the trick is it breath out downwards through your mouth, as if you were blowing your breath over your chin.

--A

[I'm Murrin]

From what I've heard the solution for fogging glasses is to use some sort of adhesive to make the mask fit snugly around your nose.

[Avatar]

Can always try the old biker trick and rub a slice of potato on the inside of the glasses. Or just get an anti-fogging lens cleaner?

--A

[Kizza]

Ha! Talking with an overbite behind a mask is so Jim Carrey.

The adhesive and the vent ideas are good ones.

Bloody potato peels!
It is karma. After it was advised to me, I told someone once if they washed their hands in urine they'd toughen up.

[Sorus]

Surgical tape. Or invest in one with a good-quality wire that you can pinch tightly at the bridge of your snoot. Vents are banned here because they lower the protection value. (Banned may be too strong a word, but I've seen at least a couple of stores that don't allow shoppers to wear them.)

[Avatar]

That's why I said the filtered vents...I guess one-way valves are a better description...like on a chest seal.

--A

[peter]

Apropos the earlier post I made in respect of vaccination, I've just watched a discussion on GMTV as to whether the submission to administration of a Covid vaccine should become a mandatory requirement when one becomes available. I find even the suggestion abhorrent, but amongst those commentators who (always with the proviso that it should be a last resort option) thought it might be appropriate, one of the chief arguments seemed to be that "you are not just doing this for your own benefit, but to protect the wider community in which you live".

Well hang on, if the vaccine confers protection to those who accept it, how are they at risk from those who don't? This doesn't seem to stack up to me. One argument might be that there will be in those who for medical reasons or whatever, cannot be vaccinated and they would be at risk from other unvaccinated individuals - but the teeth has largely been drawn from this argument already in that the doctors on the program were already asserting that the vulnerable groups, the patients with co-morbidities etc, would be the first to be vaccinated, and granted that there will be a few that cannot still be covered, this will be sufficiently small a group that it would hardly justify the mandatory enforcement of the administration of a medical procedure on the mass populace in order to protect.

The panel acknowledged the rush in which vaccines are being produced and admitted that with this haste came additional risk in terms of safety of the final product, but seemed to accept that the severity of the Covid situation might be a mitigating factor in acceptance of this elevated risk. This again is to me, anathema. These protocols have been established for very sound reasons and they should not be abandoned for any reason, pressing or otherwise.

By all means develop a vaccine if you can (no vaccine has to date ever been produced against a coronavirus) - but test it according to the established procedures (more rigorously in fact, due to its exceptionally wide-spread intention of usage) and then educate people on its merits. But introduce mandatory uptake by individuals regardless of their choice - absolutely not!

[Avatar]

I'm wondering if the apparent short-lived nature of the anti-bodies are going to make a vaccine impossible anyway. As somebody else mentioned I think, closest we might get to is a flu shot type of thing which will have to be updated regularly.

--A

[wayfriend]

I'm wondering if the apparent short-lived nature of the anti-bodies are going to make a vaccine impossible anyway. As somebody else mentioned I think, closest we might get to is a flu shot type of thing which will have to be updated regularly.

VOX: Covid-19 antibody testing, long-term immunity, vaccines, herd immunity (and more!), explained. (Jul 22, 2020)

[I'm Murrin]

"you are not just doing this for your own benefit, but to protect the wider community in which you live".

Well hang on, if the vaccine confers protection to those who accept it, how are they at risk from those who don't? This doesn't seem to stack up to me. One argument might be that there will be in those who for medical reasons or whatever, cannot be vaccinated and they would be at risk from other unvaccinated individuals - but the teeth has largely been drawn from this argument already in that the doctors on the program were already asserting that the vulnerable groups, the patients with co-morbidities etc, would be the first to be vaccinated

Everyone is at risk from this virus, not just vulnerable groups. It's had bad, long-term effects even on people who were otherwise thought healthy. Widespread herd immunity is the best way to stop the virus circulating freely, and for that you need widespread vaccination, not just the highest risk people. Your argument holds up if you assume that only the highest risk groups are vulnerable to major damage or mortality from this virus, and that they can be fully protected by just vaccinating those groups, but that's not how this works.

I can see this argument coming out because of the way the UK treats the flu vaccine (they only encourage vulnerable groups to receive it and anyone else has to request it specially), but the UK is also worse than the US and Europe on flu mortality rates.

[Sorus]

Our lockdown ended (not completely) just a few weeks ago, and people took that to mean everything was back to normal. People seem to have an it-won't-happen-to-me mentality, and now we're beating records almost every day, and not in a good way. Stopped to buy bread on my way home from work, and the bakery was closed due to employees testing positive. I wonder how bad it will get before people start taking it seriously again.

[peter]

My argument is not against vaccination - it is against mandatory vaccination. There is indeed risk to everyone from the Covid virus, but this risk is highly variable depending upon which group you happen to fall into. I can see nothing in our current knowledge of Covid-19 that would mitigate in favour of such a Draconian measure as forced vaccination and given the known risks associated with vaccine production and the reasons why such stringent protocols are in place in respect of their licencing, every reason that acceptance of a vaccine or vaccines produced where (for acknowledged reasons) these protocols have not been fully adhered to, should be entirely a decision left in the individual recipients hands.

[Sorus]

I totally agree that it should not be mandatory. But in an ideal world, most people would voluntarily opt to get one. I'm seeing a whole lot of idiots out there, and it's scary. Like you, Peter, I am an essential worker who has been on the front lines from the beginning of this mess, and I don't need some idiot putting my health at risk because they're afraid Bill Gates wants to put a microchip in them or whatever that argument is. (How did that even get started?)

[Avatar]

I see latest thinking is that the vaccine may require at least 2 time-separated shots, as well as booster shots.

--A

[sgt.null]

I totally agree that it should not be mandatory. But in an ideal world, most people would voluntarily opt to get one. I'm seeing a whole lot of idiots out there, and it's scary. Like you, Peter, I am an essential worker who has been on the front lines from the beginning of this mess, and I don't need some idiot putting my health at risk because they're afraid Bill Gates wants to put a microchip in them or whatever that argument is. (How did that even get started?)

People still don't get a flu shot every year.

They'd rather believe some crazy conspiracy.

They'd rather listen to a playboy model.[Jenny McCarthy] than get their kids vaccinated.

[Avatar]

I don't bother with a flu shot, but that's largely because the couple I've had have ended with me sicker than in years I didn't get one.

--A