Discrimination or new normal?

[GeoffH]

34 minutes ago, Tommy T. said:

Good! I know I will now sleep better tonight knowing that... especially after a few shots of Tanduay!

 

You'd get more votes Governor Tommy if you hand out some of that Tanduay 

[BrettGC]

55 minutes ago, JDDavao said:

To each his own but there are far too many reasonably sane and stable people in the world for me to put up with endless bullshit for a handful of paranoid delusionals.

 

Yep.

The double edged sword of the internet.

Pro:  People have access to more information than ever.

Con:  People have access to more information than ever.

Personally I'd rather listen to someone that has spent 20 years studying in any given field, has had their findings peer reviewed and verified scientifically than some basement dweller, that may or may not have finished high school, who's random thought bubbles that suit their agenda have gained some sort of traction on social media for whatever reason on any given issue.  

Science doesn't care what anyone "believes".

 

[Gandang Smile]

19 hours ago, Mike J said:

Actually I think it more appropriate to say that YOU did NOT put it proper context.  In fact your arguments sounded just like the rants of those who are anti any vaccine.  As far as proof of saving lives, look at those now in filling up the ICU beds in hospitals.  Read it for yourself - this is from the New York Time, just one of many articles and studies.

<snip> Serious coronavirus infections among vaccinated people have been relatively rare since the start of the vaccination campaign, a New York Times analysis of data from 40 states and Washington, D.C., shows. Fully vaccinated people have made up as few as 0.1 percent of and as many as 5 percent of those hospitalized with the virus in those states, and as few as 0.2 percent and as many as 6 percent of those who have died. <end snip>

There are just as many studies that show that:

1) natural immunity is far better than that provided by the vaccination - considering the abysmal chance of catching Covid with severe or lethal symptoms, I would catch Covid any day rather than risking my chances with an experimental vaccine technology which only use is to enrich certain Big Pharma and load up national goverments with more debt than they already have (this applies to the Philippines, as well)

2) vaccinated people do get Covid. In Israel up to 80% of hospitalized Covid patients are vaccinated, with 1 or 2 jabs. My wife has family is Israel and they all attested to that.

3) The context was the previous paragraph. I was specifically talking about Covid vaccines. Of course anti-polio and the others are a different ball game. Yet, there has been no government or private authorities who will stop me from entering because of a shot I took (or did not take) when I was a young child. 

[Gandang Smile]

15 hours ago, Jollygoodfellow said:

Some people never read the news or look at the facts like most who die in hospital from covid are not vaccinated. Sure conspiracy to fool the world that such a virus exists. Took a lot of effort in convincing so many to die and so many to act the part but it worked and now they can spread fake vaccines just for the sake of it.

Anyway a few years ago I met a guy here who told me that Queen Elizabeth and Obama and many others are Reptilians and one day we will see them turn back into lizards. We are still friends so I dont hold his weird ideas against him so there is some hope that one day we can be friends too. I just ignore his strange ways and tune out and can do the same with you and just listen to anything realistic you might dribble occasionally. Stay safe and healthy, you never know what might need to be jabbed into your arm one day. 

Well, it's a typical human tendency, to pack anybody who doesn't subscribe to a specific mainstream narrative into the same big box of flat Earthers, Reptilian-believers and such.

Most people who die from Covid are not vaccinated. But how many in total? Are we really sure it's been worth halting the world economy, to tens of trillion dollars of damage, and imposing draconian "no vax, no life" measures?

I have nothing against the vaccine per se. It's one's legitimate choice to get the jab, as it is not to. For the nth time, what I am against, and vehemently against, is the weaponisation of this choice (or non-choice) for political agendas. This is not a sign of democracy. It's a sign of an authoritarian drift.

Most people don't understand that so-called "no vax" are, really, just "pro-choice".

[Gandang Smile]

16 hours ago, Guy F. said:

Erm.... WHAT?!

As more people are vaccinated there are fewer people to function as petri dishes for the virus to reproduce and mutate in. More vaccinated people -> fewer mutations.

More vaccinated people = less natural immunity = fewer chances of non-lethal mutations.

[Mike J]

15 minutes ago, Gandang Smile said:

There are just as many studies that show that:

1) natural immunity is far better than that provided by the vaccination - considering the abysmal chance of catching Covid with severe or lethal symptoms, I would catch Covid any day rather than risking my chances with an experimental vaccine technology which only use is to enrich certain Big Pharma and load up national goverments with more debt than they already have (this applies to the Philippines, as well)

2) vaccinated people do get Covid. In Israel up to 80% of hospitalized Covid patients are vaccinated, with 1 or 2 jabs. My wife has family is Israel and they all attested to that.

3) The context was the previous paragraph. I was specifically talking about Covid vaccines. Of course anti-polio and the others are a different ball game. Yet, there has been no government or private authorities who will stop me from entering because of a shot I took (or did not take) when I was a young child. 

Below is an article that speaks to the new wave in Israel.   I added the red highlight.

https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2021/08/20/1029628471/highly-vaccinated-israel-is-seeing-a-dramatic-surge-in-new-covid-cases-heres-why

Israel was the first country on Earth to fully vaccinate a majority of its citizens against COVID-19. Now it has one of the world's highest daily infection rates — an average of nearly 7,500 confirmed cases a day, double what it was two weeks ago. Nearly one in every 150 people in Israel today has the virus.

What happened, and what can be learned about the vaccine's impact on a highly vaccinated country? Here are six lessons learned — and one looming question for the future of the pandemic.

About Goats and Soda

Goats and Soda is NPR's global health and development blog. We tell stories of life in our changing world, focusing on low- and middle-income countries. And we keep in mind that we're all neighbors in this global village. Sign up for our weekly newsletter.

1. Immunity from the vaccine dips over time.
Israel had fully vaccinated slightly over half its population by March 25. Infections waned, venues reopened to the vaccinated and the prime minister told Israelis to go out and have fun. By June, all restrictions, including indoor masking, were abolished.

But Israel paid a price for the early rollout. Health officials, and then Pfizer, said their data showed a dip in the vaccine's protection around six months after receiving the second shot.

2. The delta variant broke through the vaccine's waning protection.
It was a perfect storm: The vaccine's waning protection came around the same time the more infectious delta variant arrived in Israel this summer. Delta accounts for nearly all infections in Israel today.

"The most influential event was so many people who went abroad in the summer — vacations — and brought the delta variant very, very quickly to Israel," said Siegal Sadetzki, a former public health director in Israel's Health Ministry.

3. If you get infected, being vaccinated helps.
The good news is that among Israel's serious infections on Thursday of this week, according to Health Ministry data, the rate of serious cases among unvaccinated people over age 60 (178.7 per 100,000) was nine times more than the rate among fully vaccinated people of the same age category, and the rate of serious cases among unvaccinated people in the under-60 crowd (3.2 per 100,000) was a little more than double the rate among vaccinated people in that age bracket.

The bad news, doctors say, is that half of Israel's seriously ill patients who are currently hospitalized were fully vaccinated at least five months ago. Most of them are over 60 years old and have comorbidities. The seriously ill patients who are unvaccinated are mostly young, healthy people whose condition deteriorated quickly.

Israel's daily average number of infections has nearly doubled in the past two weeks and has increased around tenfold since mid-July, approaching the numbers during Israel's peak in the winter. Deaths increased from five in June to at least 248 so far this month. Health officials say that currently 600 seriously ill patients are hospitalized, and they warn they cannot handle more than 1,000 serious infections at the same time.

4. Israel's high vaccination rate isn't high enough.
The country jumped out ahead of all other countries on vaccines, and 78% of eligible Israelis over 12 years old are vaccinated.

But Israel has a young population, with many under the eligible age for vaccination, and about 1.1 million eligible Israelis, largely between the ages of 12 and 20, have declined to take even one dose of the vaccine.

That means only 58% of Israel's total citizenry is fully vaccinated. Experts say that's not nearly high enough.

"We have a very large fraction of our population who are paying the price for a small fraction of the population who did not go to get the vaccine," said Eran Segal of the Weizmann Institute of Science, who advises the Israeli government on COVID-19.

Unvaccinated people helped fuel the rapid spread of the virus while the country remained open for business in recent months with few serious restrictions.

"That will lead to mass infection, which is exactly what we are seeing now," said Segal.

5. Vaccinations are key, but they are not enough.
Israel is trying to slow the wave without resorting to a new lockdown, which Prime Minister Naftali Bennett says would take an economic toll and "destroy the future of the country." The country is placing caps on gatherings, increasing hospital staff and pleading for unvaccinated people to get immunized.

On Israel's doorstep, the vaccination rate is much lower in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and the Gaza Strip. Only around 8% of Palestinians have been fully vaccinated. Palestinians are wary of certain brands of vaccine in ample supply, like AstraZeneca's, while Pfizer-BioNTech's vaccine is in shorter supply for Palestinians. But the Palestinian population is not a source of transmission in Israel. Only vaccinated Palestinians are given permits to enter Israel and Israeli settlements.

As for the low rate of vaccination in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, "we don't have a shortage of vaccine. It is the hesitancy," said Randa Abu Rabe, a local World Health Organization official working in the Palestinian territories.

An Israeli health worker administers a third dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine at a vaccination center in Jerusalem. Israel is the first country to launch a national booster campaign for the Pfizer vaccine.
Menahem Kahana/AFP via Getty Images
6. Booster shots offer more protection — if you are one of the world's lucky few to get them.
Israel is the first country to offer a third shot of the Pfizer vaccine in a nationwide booster campaign. Preliminary research in Israel suggests booster shots significantly increase protection against the coronavirus a week after a person receives the third dose.

COVID Booster Shots Are Coming. Here's What You Need To Know
SHOTS - HEALTH NEWS
COVID Booster Shots Are Coming. Here's What You Need To Know
Israeli national HMO Maccabi Healthcare Services, which conducted the preliminary study of 149,144 Israelis who received three Pfizer shots, said for Israelis above age 60, a Pfizer booster shot reduced the chances of infection by 86% and reduced the chances of severe infection by 92%.

The early data reflects studies by vaccine-makers Pfizer and Moderna and provides a glimpse at boosters' effects in a real-world setting.

After reviewing data on breakthrough infections in Israel, the U.S. announced a booster shot campaign beginning in late September for anyone eight months after their second shot. The U.K. has promised boosters soon, and Turkey is offering Pfizer shots to those immunized with the Sinovac vaccine to help citizens planning to travel, since some countries will not recognize the Chinese vaccine.

Israel has lowered the minimum age for boosters to 40. "The triple dose is the solution to curbing the current infection outbreak," Anat Ekka Zohar of Maccabi said in a statement.

Boosters are not being offered in the Palestinian territories yet, and the World Health Organization has called on countries to stop giving COVID-19 booster shots in order to help poorer countries get vaccinated.

Why A Push For Boosters Could Make The Pandemic Even Worse
GOATS AND SODA
Why A Push For Boosters Could Make The Pandemic Even Worse
"Israel very much respects the World Health Organization but acts according to local considerations and the interests of Israeli citizens. We help the world a lot," an Israeli health official told NPR, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly about the issue. "If the U.N. didn't secure enough vaccines for Chad, Mali, Myanmar and Guatemala, that doesn't mean that Israel shouldn't seek to prevent a pandemic from happening here."

Experts warn if countries do not vaccinate their populations, more variants will develop, threatening even vaccinated nations.

Looming question: Will we need COVID-19 vaccines every several months? We don't know.
The Cinema City movie theater complex in Jerusalem teems with young children and parents, but steps from the box office is a makeshift vaccination station where dozens of mostly older residents wait their turn to get booster shots.

More than a million Israelis have received a Pfizer booster shot in the last several weeks. They are being watched around the world, as Israel is the first nation to give a third dose of Pfizer on a mass scale, just as it was ahead of the curve on the first round of shots.

"They make the test of us," said Etti Ben Yaakov, sitting in a vaccination booth with her brother as he got a booster shot. "But in the first [round], it was the same. So I don't feel it's something wrong. I think it's good."

She predicts the coronavirus, like the flu, will mean shots every year. "We will have to live with the corona," she said.

Ido Hadari, of HMO Maccabi, which led the preliminary booster shot study, questioned whether regular shots will become the norm.

"I don't know of any disease where we are vaccinated every six months, and to be honest, I don't think the public will come to get vaccinated every six months," Hadari said. "But you cannot predict anything with this disease."

[Gandang Smile]

@Mike J I could reply with one of the thousand articles that criticise the narrative below, disprove it with just as much science and facts. In the end, as many says, it's a debate between two people not scientifically informed or exposed, so we have to both rely on second-hand information.

You will then agree that the "my source is better than yours" becomes a puerile spitting context.

My wife and I will continue to do what we believe is best for us. Everybody else can happily take their booster shot every 6 months, as that's the endgame of all this. Health and safety of the populace are the last thing on their to-do list.

All I am against is the (prospected) inability to lead a normal life without having to show a QR code that screams "blind compliance" before boarding a train or walking into a restaurants.

 

10 minutes ago, Mike J said:

Below is an article that speaks to the new wave in Israel.   I added the red highlight.

https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2021/08/20/1029628471/highly-vaccinated-israel-is-seeing-a-dramatic-surge-in-new-covid-cases-heres-why

Israel was the first country on Earth to fully vaccinate a majority of its citizens against COVID-19. Now it has one of the world's highest daily infection rates — an average of nearly 7,500 confirmed cases a day, double what it was two weeks ago. Nearly one in every 150 people in Israel today has the virus.

What happened, and what can be learned about the vaccine's impact on a highly vaccinated country? Here are six lessons learned — and one looming question for the future of the pandemic.

About Goats and Soda

Goats and Soda is NPR's global health and development blog. We tell stories of life in our changing world, focusing on low- and middle-income countries. And we keep in mind that we're all neighbors in this global village. Sign up for our weekly newsletter.

1. Immunity from the vaccine dips over time.
Israel had fully vaccinated slightly over half its population by March 25. Infections waned, venues reopened to the vaccinated and the prime minister told Israelis to go out and have fun. By June, all restrictions, including indoor masking, were abolished.

But Israel paid a price for the early rollout. Health officials, and then Pfizer, said their data showed a dip in the vaccine's protection around six months after receiving the second shot.

2. The delta variant broke through the vaccine's waning protection.
It was a perfect storm: The vaccine's waning protection came around the same time the more infectious delta variant arrived in Israel this summer. Delta accounts for nearly all infections in Israel today.

"The most influential event was so many people who went abroad in the summer — vacations — and brought the delta variant very, very quickly to Israel," said Siegal Sadetzki, a former public health director in Israel's Health Ministry.

3. If you get infected, being vaccinated helps.
The good news is that among Israel's serious infections on Thursday of this week, according to Health Ministry data, the rate of serious cases among unvaccinated people over age 60 (178.7 per 100,000) was nine times more than the rate among fully vaccinated people of the same age category, and the rate of serious cases among unvaccinated people in the under-60 crowd (3.2 per 100,000) was a little more than double the rate among vaccinated people in that age bracket.

The bad news, doctors say, is that half of Israel's seriously ill patients who are currently hospitalized were fully vaccinated at least five months ago. Most of them are over 60 years old and have comorbidities. The seriously ill patients who are unvaccinated are mostly young, healthy people whose condition deteriorated quickly.

Israel's daily average number of infections has nearly doubled in the past two weeks and has increased around tenfold since mid-July, approaching the numbers during Israel's peak in the winter. Deaths increased from five in June to at least 248 so far this month. Health officials say that currently 600 seriously ill patients are hospitalized, and they warn they cannot handle more than 1,000 serious infections at the same time.

4. Israel's high vaccination rate isn't high enough.
The country jumped out ahead of all other countries on vaccines, and 78% of eligible Israelis over 12 years old are vaccinated.

But Israel has a young population, with many under the eligible age for vaccination, and about 1.1 million eligible Israelis, largely between the ages of 12 and 20, have declined to take even one dose of the vaccine.

That means only 58% of Israel's total citizenry is fully vaccinated. Experts say that's not nearly high enough.

"We have a very large fraction of our population who are paying the price for a small fraction of the population who did not go to get the vaccine," said Eran Segal of the Weizmann Institute of Science, who advises the Israeli government on COVID-19.

Unvaccinated people helped fuel the rapid spread of the virus while the country remained open for business in recent months with few serious restrictions.

"That will lead to mass infection, which is exactly what we are seeing now," said Segal.

5. Vaccinations are key, but they are not enough.
Israel is trying to slow the wave without resorting to a new lockdown, which Prime Minister Naftali Bennett says would take an economic toll and "destroy the future of the country." The country is placing caps on gatherings, increasing hospital staff and pleading for unvaccinated people to get immunized.

On Israel's doorstep, the vaccination rate is much lower in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and the Gaza Strip. Only around 8% of Palestinians have been fully vaccinated. Palestinians are wary of certain brands of vaccine in ample supply, like AstraZeneca's, while Pfizer-BioNTech's vaccine is in shorter supply for Palestinians. But the Palestinian population is not a source of transmission in Israel. Only vaccinated Palestinians are given permits to enter Israel and Israeli settlements.

As for the low rate of vaccination in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, "we don't have a shortage of vaccine. It is the hesitancy," said Randa Abu Rabe, a local World Health Organization official working in the Palestinian territories.

An Israeli health worker administers a third dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine at a vaccination center in Jerusalem. Israel is the first country to launch a national booster campaign for the Pfizer vaccine.
Menahem Kahana/AFP via Getty Images
6. Booster shots offer more protection — if you are one of the world's lucky few to get them.
Israel is the first country to offer a third shot of the Pfizer vaccine in a nationwide booster campaign. Preliminary research in Israel suggests booster shots significantly increase protection against the coronavirus a week after a person receives the third dose.

COVID Booster Shots Are Coming. Here's What You Need To Know
SHOTS - HEALTH NEWS
COVID Booster Shots Are Coming. Here's What You Need To Know
Israeli national HMO Maccabi Healthcare Services, which conducted the preliminary study of 149,144 Israelis who received three Pfizer shots, said for Israelis above age 60, a Pfizer booster shot reduced the chances of infection by 86% and reduced the chances of severe infection by 92%.

The early data reflects studies by vaccine-makers Pfizer and Moderna and provides a glimpse at boosters' effects in a real-world setting.

After reviewing data on breakthrough infections in Israel, the U.S. announced a booster shot campaign beginning in late September for anyone eight months after their second shot. The U.K. has promised boosters soon, and Turkey is offering Pfizer shots to those immunized with the Sinovac vaccine to help citizens planning to travel, since some countries will not recognize the Chinese vaccine.

Israel has lowered the minimum age for boosters to 40. "The triple dose is the solution to curbing the current infection outbreak," Anat Ekka Zohar of Maccabi said in a statement.

Boosters are not being offered in the Palestinian territories yet, and the World Health Organization has called on countries to stop giving COVID-19 booster shots in order to help poorer countries get vaccinated.

Why A Push For Boosters Could Make The Pandemic Even Worse
GOATS AND SODA
Why A Push For Boosters Could Make The Pandemic Even Worse
"Israel very much respects the World Health Organization but acts according to local considerations and the interests of Israeli citizens. We help the world a lot," an Israeli health official told NPR, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly about the issue. "If the U.N. didn't secure enough vaccines for Chad, Mali, Myanmar and Guatemala, that doesn't mean that Israel shouldn't seek to prevent a pandemic from happening here."

Experts warn if countries do not vaccinate their populations, more variants will develop, threatening even vaccinated nations.

Looming question: Will we need COVID-19 vaccines every several months? We don't know.
The Cinema City movie theater complex in Jerusalem teems with young children and parents, but steps from the box office is a makeshift vaccination station where dozens of mostly older residents wait their turn to get booster shots.

More than a million Israelis have received a Pfizer booster shot in the last several weeks. They are being watched around the world, as Israel is the first nation to give a third dose of Pfizer on a mass scale, just as it was ahead of the curve on the first round of shots.

"They make the test of us," said Etti Ben Yaakov, sitting in a vaccination booth with her brother as he got a booster shot. "But in the first [round], it was the same. So I don't feel it's something wrong. I think it's good."

She predicts the coronavirus, like the flu, will mean shots every year. "We will have to live with the corona," she said.

Ido Hadari, of HMO Maccabi, which led the preliminary booster shot study, questioned whether regular shots will become the norm.

"I don't know of any disease where we are vaccinated every six months, and to be honest, I don't think the public will come to get vaccinated every six months," Hadari said. "But you cannot predict anything with this disease."

Edited September 4, 2021 by Gandang Smile

[Jollygoodfellow]

7 minutes ago, Gandang Smile said:

All I am against is the (prospected) inability to lead a normal life without having to show a QR code that screams "blind compliance" before boarding a train or walking into a restaurants.

 

Then you will most likely need to get used to the new normal or learn how to survive as this is life now. Believe it or not.

[Jollygoodfellow]

4 hours ago, Tommy T. said:

Regarding discrimination... Should this forum continue to refer to Mr. DJT as President or Former President in the automatic edit? Is there a bias here?

The point is that people will bring up certain names forever. The way I see it is if anyone does not understand or like it then f&*k off as we in this climate dont need to give a shit about past or future political crap. 

Yep i'm an asshole but I dont care.  

[graham59]

9 minutes ago, Gandang Smile said:

All I am against is the (prospected) inability to lead a normal life without having to show a QR code that screams "blind compliance" before boarding a train or walking into a restaurants.

Not unlike being required to have a sight test, before being given a driving licence...and then of course being required to show that, upon request by the authorities...should you wish to drive anywhere.