Yes, MD vax rate is high. I know of three (early 30’s) ROAD residents who only got the vax bcos their hospital required it last spring. Otherwise, they would not have. But there are thousands of other folks in the industry who remain unvaccinated and are publicly (and legally) fighting it. (A “small percent” of large portion of the US economy is a really big number.)
My point is that if health care workers – who see the covid carnage every day – remain skeptical, how can you expect regular folk to get on vax train with all the mixed messaging?
So then, isn’t self-protection the best reason to be vaxed? Seems a pretty simple and convincing point to bring up and is probably a lot more persuasive than pointing out all these other supposed Christians who are so mean and selfish. And of course if they really are Christians, then they’ll understand the difference between a speck and a plank.
Getting COVID-19 can certainly limit your freedom, in the short term (being sick limits what you can do), long term (if you get long-haul COVID-19), or permanently (if you die).
Pollution of shared resources (e.g. from smoking, as another poster mentioned above, or from other activities) is a known negative externality that is often regulated by societies.
Ancient societies did have awareness of contagious diseases and did require the equivalent of isolation or quarantine by those who were found (within the capabilities of medical diagnosis of the time) to have them.
“The attitudes of health care workers toward the COVID-19 vaccine essentially mirror the rest of the country — with those living in rural areas, are Republican and have less education and income more likely to be vaccine-resistant.”
"Among the reasons: The research was done too quickly; it wasn’t fully FDA-approved (at first); they already have antibodies from working the front lines of the pandemic or perhaps from getting the virus already. Many are concerned about how the vaccine affects fertility.
To be clear, all of these concerns have been addressed by scientific experts, and the overwhelming evidence is that the COVID-19 vaccines are safe and effective."
"But Butler points out that widespread misinformation plays a role here, too. And nurses are not taught the ins and outs of vaccine research. The vaccination gap between physicians and nurses, she says, comes down to an education gap.
“When you have these new diseases popping up, it’s really on nurses to educate themselves on what the research is,” Butler says. “You had nurses who were floundering, looking for information. So now we see this educational gap.”
“We are seeing the nurses who weren’t trained to recognize poorly written studies; they weren’t trained to recognize anti-vaccine propaganda,” she says. “And it’s very convincing. That’s what our struggle is in the nursing community.”
People think all health care workers know everything, but it isn’t so in reality. Not all doctors/nurses/other health care workers work with Covid patients either. There’s still everything else going on in people’s lives, just as there was pre-Covid.
Your friend should have choice over her own body. That is a freedom that is quite respected in this country, as we all know. One must also strive to do things that don’t directly or indirectly harm others, but the vaccine isn’t the only way to keep people safe. It’s a layer of protection that allows other layers to be removed. So we need to be careful in how we are judging people on this issue as it’s really about their conduct and whether they are contributing to lower spread or not. Even if vaccinated, they may be acting in an irresponsible manner that infects others. But someone who is practicing good Covid protocols but chooses not to get vaccinated is not necessarily a harm to others.
Of course, since most can get vaccinated, they should do so if they wish to remove the layers of protection required for this pandemic (such as social distancing most of the time and masking). Our health experts are citing self-protection as the #1 reason to be vaccinated - you lower your own risk of hospitalization and death. I’m following the MN breakthrough data and current average efficacy rates against infection, hospitalization and death are about 65%, 81%, and 71% respectively since Delta-infested mid-August. So here in MN, despite Delta, the vaccines are very protective!
It is very unfortunate that your family and friends have had such a horrible experience. No one chooses to get sick and/or die from an infectious disease but unfortunately in a pandemic that will happen and not always with easy answers as to why or how. I get the lesson you wish to impart on your friend; if I were in her shoes, what would scare me into getting vaxxed ASAP, knowing your story, would be that Covid can just rip through a family and kill several of them. We’ve seen this time and again (why? haven’t seen an answer on that one yet). One doesn’t choose to get infected with this deadly virus, but it can happen with no idea of how and oftentimes before one realizes what is happening. And sometimes by then it’s too late to do much but slowly decline. It’s not a quick death. There is lots of time for reflection, fear and regret. To me, that would be quite a convincing lesson.
Yes, there are 3 possible choices: 1) get the vaccine, 2) get COVID, or 3) live like a hermit e.g. Howard Hughes. If someone makes the choice to not get the vaccine, fine. Good luck to you living alone like a hermit, and we’ll see you on the other side. But if you choose to not get the vaccine and you want to be involved in society, you are now infringing on my rights.
Nope, still need to wear a mask and socially distance. Unless you want to gauge level of risk and proceed accordingly (if you want to try to socialize or something).
Me? I guess I’m more on the Howard Hughes end - vaccinated, still wear a mask, haven’t been to a restaurant (just once, outdoors), no travel, no shopping (everything online and/or delivered). I’m waiting, hoping to see more social responsibility in others.
Yes, one’s freedom is limited when they are ill - but who is at fault and will need to pay restitution? It’s a distinct issue from theft which is the direct taking of someone else’s property. The Ancients respected private property (as we do today) and they also recognized that infectious disease doesn’t respect boundaries. Hence the rules were distinct for each back then . . . and today.
Pollution/cigarette smoke is a much better analogy to the pandemic. Both are spread through our actions w/o much thought of the additional costs imposed upon others. An infectious person isn’t stealing someone’s airspace; rather, they are releasing a contagion into public airways shared by all. These more “pure” externalities are best dealt with as a matter of “public welfare” and their regulation is quite distinct from criminal and civil codes regarding theft. While keeping crime down also keeps the social fabric intact (thus contributing to "public welfare), the primary violation and consequence pertain to the individual harmed. It’s not a regulatory matter but one of individual punishment, deterrence, and restoration. Social benefits are secondary. That’s why ancient laws dealing with theft were quite intricate in what the individual had to do to make good with their victim, whereas lepers were simply shipped off to the colony well away from the healthy sections of the community.
Agree that one is always free to add on those extra layers and YMMV depending on the severity of the variant. Also sorry - I should have added testing to those as well. But at some point we have to face the reality of your reasoning here: the benefit to the vaccines are what, exactly, if every other layer of protection must also be added back?
Uh yeah, you are I are a bit different here and you will need to wait a long time for me to stop traveling, shopping and eating out! I follow the advice of my state’s health experts and governor. However, I do suspect that the Howard Hughes’ish types are holding out better than the extroverts in this pandemic (I don’t really consider myself either - more of an in-betweener).
I doubt it’s the healthcare workers on the front lines who are reluctant. From a Washington Post article(and I’ve seen many more like this):
<<< The workers are baffled over how, after so much pain and death, there is still even a debate over whether to get vaccinated or wear a mask in public. Their patience is wearing thin, they say. And as they toil in stifling plastic protective gear, or glance down the growing lists of new patients to contact, exhaustion has settled in. Many have quit, Patel said, or are thinking about it.>>>
There is a research paper on anti-vaxxers, which should come out soon. The team which has been studying the anti-vaxx community since before COVID, and have also looked at how the anti-vaxxers and the COVID deniers differ and where they overlap.
She should have the choice, and she has made it. I neglected to frame the context of her social media post, which was something about restaurants not letting in unvaxxed people, and how people will just stay home and cook, so restaurants will fail. She also included theaters and museums, etc… in her post. She’s made her choice not to participate in those aspects of society, at least in the area where we live.
In light of recent events, I do wonder how respected it is.
While I don’t approve, I understand that some people don’t want to vaccinate. They shouldn’t then complain when they are excluded from things in the name of public safety.
I don’t disagree, creek land, and never implied otherwise. But the NPR data clearly refute your claim that its only a small percentage of health care workers that are un-vaxxed.
(There have been several posts on this thread suggesting that the un-vaxxed go to the back of the hospital line when resources are scarce. But they forget/ignore that many of those folks are health care workers themselves.)
Brutal job, I get it. But the front line workers all have friends in the industry and share war stories. More than a quarter of health care workers unvaxxed is millions of folks, (most of whom should know better).
But, to the extent that specializations and skills allow, could the vaccine-refusing health care workers be redeployed to care for COVID-19 patients, since they are saying that they do not consider the risk of COVID-19 to be high enough to be worth getting the vaccine themselves? (Plus, since the COVID-19 patients already have COVID-19, those patients will not worry about getting COVID-19 from an unvaccinated health care worker like non-COVID-19 patients may.)
That’s because it’s a pandemic and the vaccine doesn’t have 100% efficacy. However it notably reduces the risk of hospitalization and death. Health experts seem to be of the opinion that the vaccine can substitute for things like de-densification, social distancing at all times, even periodic testing. The surge we’ve been having is blamed on the unvaccinated, not the vaccinated who are out and about. Choices should be respected but some are obviously going to make the choice that living the Howard Hughes lifestyle may not be the most beneficial to their family or loved ones. I’m not sure he died a particularly happy man.
I was only quoting some of it on here because not everyone likes to click on the links, not to imply you disagreed, esp when you posted the link.
If an election were won with 73% to 27% it would be considered a landslide, and when it comes to health care workers, those who know the most about it (most educated) have even larger stats for the landslide.
Then too, if you took out the percentage who likely can’t be vaccinated (true medical reasons), you have more, plus those who already had Covid and feel their natural immunity is fine (as it may well be), even more.
Out of 100 health care workers, few are anti-vax.
Actual numbers probably skew red/blue based upon how this all got political unfortunately.
Well everyone usually has something to complain about! But I agree with you that businesses should be able to require vaccination, masking etc. of their customers. Same with colleges and universities.
