Hmm. I wonder if they have seen the occasional successful GoFundMe and think that they will get their story out and bring in millions in donations.

dola

And I am once again wrong about how people were going to react. I thought that a lot of people had dug their heels in as anti-vax and needed an out to get the vax while saving face.

An employer mandate is the perfect face-saving out. "I still believe everything I said. I'm just here so I don't get fired."

But man, these people really are serious. Like PM said, they are willing to lose really good jobs over this.

There are companies advertising open roles with the lack of vaccine mandates as a benefit.

https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update...0039659212800/

NY state has a vaccine mandate for healthcare workers and I guarantee some nurses are going to shitcan their career over this. They've already been mandated for a host of vaccines and regular health checks, but they won't do this.

I'll be interested in finding out who is leaving next week. I'm aware of about 8 or 9 people who are not yet vaxxed. You can kinda tell who it is because they are required to wear masks in the office. As far as I can tell, it's mainly our facilities staff (building manager and his crew, a couple of security I think). I do not believe we have any executives who are in this group.

So, aside from cleaning crew types, if we lose our facilities manager (a long-term employee), that's fairly significant given that he manages several commercial buildings and farms for the company.

When you start to view it through the prism of it being a cult, it makes more sense.

Several have already been fired and arrested for using fake vaccine cards.

The collective crankdom of nurses is an interesting substory to come out of all this.

Right? Who knew.

I know several nurses and from my experiences they aren't sending their best (some are amazing, but a lot more are crazy people)

I wonder how much of that is driven by the fact that they end up doing the bulk of the work that gets publicly credited to doctors & specialists, and they've kind of convinced themselves that they are the real medical authorities as a result.

I don't know how true it is, but I get the impression that nurse is a redemptive career path for a lot of marginalized/fringe folks.

Nurse willing to lose career over unlawfully signing mask opt-outs for school kids in Florida. The well is deep.

I-TEAM: Nurse investigated for allegedly writing mask opt-out notes at public park

I'm sure she's a damn lib cuz stats and all...

I think the latter is too complicated. It's one of the few jobs with a near guaranteed employment rate and good pay (even if the conditions often suck). People have headed in bulk to health care as other industries have collapsed so it looks kindof like IT did right before the bubble burst (still here to some degree) where you have a bunch of people chasing dollars instead of being interested/good at the job.


To be fair, I've known a number of nurses who do know more than a lot of doctors they work for.

SI

I think there's also a chiropractor doing this too.

Going back to earlier discussions, this is the biggest part of the problem. Some of these people really believe this stuff. If enough of them are willing to lose jobs ... the numbers of them who actually are doing that I don't have a good handle on ... it will have big repercussions in the economy even for the rest of the country.

I guess they will always have a high turnover of staff over the next few years…

That’s what I found with the only serious medical care I’ve ever needed help with (sports injury)

Why would a company have a mask mandate if the employees are working remotely and traveling around with their family? Especially if the employer does not have to provide healthcare benefits.

I don't disagree, I guess it was the tone of the post that got to me.

I would like to see the Venn diagram of the people who would apply for those jobs and the people who were desperate to get back into the office as opposed to working remotely a few months ago.

My company just announced vaccination as a condition of employment. Two very competent peers have very principled anti vax positions. One is simply anti vaccine, has been for her self and family for years. Her kids got vaxed only when her and her husband made the decision to move the kids to public school because it was required. She relented to the mandate, and got her first shot this week. The other is pretty much anti chemicals anti medication in her body. She won't take an aspirin, and she is applying the same consideration to the vaccine. She appears to be holding her ground, and is looking for alternatives.

Neither of the above examples are in the least bit conservative politically, so the opposition to a vaccine mandate isn't coming from the quarters that I expected. Another bit of friction has been from people have have reported been vaccinated, but are reluctant to provide "proof" to the company.

There are some non-conservative anti-vac people. The Right-wingers are just the loudest group.

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I'm good with this. Another consideration for the unvaccinated.

But I've not heard much in MSM from unvaccinated people that had to pay for their own healthcare deductible. You'd think there would be a lot of stories here. Wish this was more widely publicized.

The Cost Of Being Unvaccinated Just Went Up — Most Insurers Are Passing Costs Back To Patients As Covid Hospitalizations Soar

There's always been a "granola"-y sort that's associated with the Pacific Northwest (but not exclusively there) that's anti-vax, as well.

SI

I don't have full access to the article/data, but... whoa

The Economist journalists updated their a model of the true death toll of the pandemic, corrected for underreporting.

They come to the conclusion that 15.2 million have died, more than 3-times the official toll of 4.6m.

This map shows the distribution of the death rate. pic.twitter.com/8ZMdm7LmzY

— Max Roser (@MaxCRoser) September 4, 2021

Yeah, that was a shocker. When we're able to put a global total on the pandemic, it's going to be tens of millions.

I'm actually surprised it's that low. I'd expect it to go up as more studies come in over the decades to come.

Here's another thread with about 70 comments on it, from Fargo, North Dakota, just look at the extent of the belief system in play. Blows my mind. It really does. It's amazing the extent that Fox et al have on intelligent thought.

https://www.facebook.com/46959023092...8289462398093/

That was Ralph Wiggum for Ivermectin

As always... don't read the comments. You lose faith in humanity pretty easily that way.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/07/b...ons-delta.html

Story about more evidence showing that breakthrough infections are still very rare.

I think that we are all making too much of breakthrough infections because even people who approach COVID very differently have their own reasons to want to pass on those stories.

If you are very worried about COVID, then you are worried about breakthrough infections, and you pass on stories about them b/c they scare you.

If you aren't worried about COVID and/or don't want a vax, then you pass on stories about breakthrough infections because you want to show that the vax doesn't really help.

But, really, the story is that the vax really works and if you have one you should worry less and if you don't you should worry more.

If it bleeds, it leads.

If that's true, then why isn't my anus president?

Well, I voted for it.

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You know, this could all be over within a month/month-and-a-half, if everybody just got their damn shots.

Yup.

Here's what I think the best way out in considering political realities

(1) Approve for < 12
(2) Make vax required for air travel
(3) Make vax required for school (including college) attendance (I'm willing to excuse age groups for whom only the EUA is available until their age gets full approval.)
(4) Make vax required for military and all other public employment (including cops, firemen, public school teachers, EMTs, etc.)
(5) Encourage as many private businesses as possible to mandate vax for employment.

Then let the chips fall where they may. I think that that gets us pretty close to where we need to be. People can still choose not to take it, but they will have to feel some consequences for their decision.

FWIW, things I am not in favor of are

(1) Letting insurance charge you more if you are unvaxxed (that's just opening the door to letting them bring back pre-existing condition bans)

(2) Tying public assistance money to vaccination status (you should get the money if you need it. It isn't up to Big Brother to decide if you are "worthy poor" or "undeserving poor.")

My company announced weekly drawings the next 12 weeks for those who are vaxxed.

$5k
$1k
3x $500
10x $250

weird how the same thread lines can be drawn even though some want to argue statistics and grasp at straws but it's clear as day beyond the gaslighting that the political reality for the greater whole (sans outliers) is that the extreme Right Trumpians are the ones that are anti-vax and anti-mask:

With Trump in the rearview mirror, Proud Boys offer muscle at rallies against vaccine mandates, masks

Read an article that said covid is worse this Labor Day vs last year. Looked at the graph in worldometers and sure enough - in infections and deaths.

Also, yesterday's deaths were 1,700+ vs 4-6 weeks ago when it was less than 1,000 and it was 400-500 at a low this year (that I remember).

I would like to know how many of the 1,700 are < 18. Those I have regret for. Assume the vast majority of 1,700 are eligible (medical conditions notwithstanding) and chose not to.

For our vaccinated family, it doesn't feel as much of a crisis or as "desperate" as it did last year. Partly because of no daily Trump-stuff but also because many of these deaths are somewhat self-inflicted.

I agree with this. I'd also add

(6) Have business clearly state they are mandating masks, vaccinations and/or not. Thinking about restaurants, grocery stores, ubers, sporting events and like. Force companies to take a stand
(7) Need some sort of "passport" so these can be enforced

In general, non-government businesses need to get more involved.



For (1), I don't see much of a difference with health insurance charging smokers more. But I do see the slippery slope.

For (2), I agree with this.

I don't think that they should charge smokers more either. But that seems to be baked into the cake at this point.

Why shouldn't they charge smokers more? It is a voluntary decision that has tremendous negative effects on your health and leads to more illness (more $$). If I have been convicted of DUI, I expect my insurance (if I can get it) to be monumentally higher.

Call The General!

Since United Airlines announced that vaccines would be required for employees last month, more than half of its unvaccinated employees have gotten their shots. Employees who do not get vaccinated by Sept. 27 risk termination or unpaid leave. https://t.co/N3XYEszyXm

— The Associated Press (@AP) September 8, 2021

A lot of vax opposition is soft. Some people will always refuse. But a lot of folks aren't going to lose their jobs over this.

The private sector is what can really get us over the hump, I think.

We have 4 people in our company who have yet to get vaxxed and tomorrow is the deadline. The most high profile is our facilities manager, and they are apparently meeting again with him today. From what I've heard, his excuse is that he "doesn't believe in doctors," has seen a doctor maybe 3 or 4 times in the past 20 years and is healthy (despite having a beachball stomach and being a smoker - he's healthy!).

This is a guy who is in love with Corvettes. He's part of a Corvette club, does all of these drives, etc. If that thing so much as sputtered once, he'd take a day off work to have a mechanic look at it. But, he "doesn't believe in doctors."

Another guy who repeatedly railed against the vaccine on the basis of his religion got vaxxed. Apparently he found the loophole is his religious beliefs that allowed him to get the shot.

A very popular (and unvaccinated) high school teacher and coach in the area died, and according to some involved in the subsequent social media news article bickering, that is still "not the time to talk about vaccines".

It seemed like he was a really well-known in a community that has more than their share of anti-vaxxers. But no one will admit to this changing any of their minds. Instead, it seems like the evolution in their delusion is blaming the hospitals. Which is ironic because several hospitals in the area have entered "crisis" mode, which apparently means that people who who have had heart attacks or were involved in car accidents are being turned away for unvaccinated COVID patients.

Which is starting to make me lose some sympathy for the plight of the hospitals, when, I'm reading about more and more doctors taking a stand and refusing to treat unvaccinated people. I suppose that may not be an option at a hospital level because of laws requiring treatment of anyone who shows up, but, I think we need to re-examine the roles of hospitals in the stage of pandemics when a vaccine is freely and easily available.

Well my conservative mother finally got the vaccine. She was motivated by the fact that her boss caught the covids.

No way people experiencing medical emergencies should be turned away in favor of unvaccinated Covid patients. The unvaccinated should be last in line. They don't trust doctors anyway...

Same people who probably say it isn't the right time to talk gun control after a bunch of kids get shot.

I honestly do not know what I would do if a loved one died for lack of care because of unvaxed covid patients.

I called it a few pages back that these people would start blaming the hospitals.

What's the theory? The hospitals are letting them die on purpose?

I read an article where a doctor was saying a lot of people are asking for the vaccine literally with their last breath. I doubt these people have a solid reason how or why the doctors and hospitals killed them, they just refuse to hold the person accountable for their own actions that led them there, so they have to blame someone.

This story has been in the news here on several channels this week.

Cancer patient told to wait for hospital beds to have surgery

The crazy thing is Beshear has actually had a good head on his shoulders about this all from what I have seen. Can you imagine the ones like DeSantis, Abbot, Noem, etc...

Something to do with not providing the right treatments they read about on conservative blogs or something.

It's beyond frustrating. He has handled the pandemic so well, steering clear of politics and focusing on science in making decisions. The GOP-controlled legislature is of course pissed at all of this, so they passed laws earlier this year to restrict the executive branch's ability to govern during an emergency, requiring that any executive decisions be brought before the legislature to determine whether to continue them going forward.

So, Beshear is effectively powerless going forward, and the legislature is going to decide what will or won't be allowed. I believe some of his emergency administrative regs are allowed to continue until January (for now), but they are likely going to remove school mask mandates, for one.

Meanwhile, our positivity rate is over 14% and we're averaging like 5K cases a day, breaking records from last year and now the past couple of weeks on the daily.

I'm still completely baffled by the end game on the anti-mask and anti-virtual school crowd. NO ONE wants schools to have to go virtual, but no masks means infections continue to rise, which means more kids/staff are out of school due to positive tests and quarantining, which means at some point you reach a critical mass of just not being able to have school. Lexington has been cancelling 6-12 bus routes a day, calling parents the morning of as bus drivers call in sick or they don't have enough drivers for all of the routes. I just don't get what freedom to not wear a mask gets you when your kid is forced to sit in their house for school, which is what everyone complained about last year.

Yeah, I heard him on CNN and he sounded really tired and frustrated.

As for the endgame, there isn't one and the goalposts will move. We have a very vocal group of anti mask parents here in my town. You literally can not interact with them. I've asked what the end game is. They say no masks in school. I say, ok, then what happens when infections rise and we have to quarantine or go virtual. They ask why and state the virus isn't dangerous to kids, and if the teachers are vaccinated what is the big deal.

I listen to a lot of metal/punk rock and subscribe to some bands pages on Facebook. A lot of bands are requiring proof of vax for shows, either because the venue, ticket seller, etc...and it is amazing how many people take the line that they remember when punk rock was anti establishment.

When has anti establishment been about killing yourself to own the man?

The wife and I are traveling to Jamaica in two weeks for our 10-year wedding anniversary. We are both fully vaccinated and it's through Sandals (they *seem* to have things fairly locked down). They routinely test all their staff and we have to test 72 hours before the flight, when we arrive and then 72 hours before we come back. Also, since it is all inclusive, we don't carry cash/cards while at the resort. We are a little stressed, but have been looking at the August and September reviews (when Jamaica ticked up in cases) and none have mentioned getting covid (almost all have been positive). It seems like there's a curfew/lockdown that is preventing a lot of movement on the island with most of the cases happening in hospitals and non-resort areas.

Yeah, the doctors are using the wrong treatments, using the CDC protocol or some nonsense. Patients can't just go into a hospital like it's a Burger King and have it your way, demanding doctors treat them with horse paste, essential oils, extra vitamin supplements, "the treatment our Real President got", and prayers to OT God that saves them because they're righteous but condemns everyone else like, well, old school OT God.

SI

If I was morally corrupt I'd setup an alternative "Patriot hospital" around here where masks are banned, you must sign an affidavit indicating that you have not been vaccinated, and we only use treatments mentioned on Fox News or Facebook conspiracy groups. And prayer.

I've read people saying ventilators are actually what is killing people.

That reminds me of the old tech support joke that the magic smoke in CPUs is what keeps them working. Once that smoke releases from the PC board, the PC no longer works.

This is both sad and hilarious. This is the GOP today - just meme-ing empty, stupid, conflated "messages" that don't even make sense. I mean... apparently the unvaccinated don't think their lives matter!

Who is he trying to convince - them, or us?

Unvaccinated Lives Matter!

— Jim Banks (@RepJimBanks) September 9, 2021

We want then to get a vaccine, they don't, and we're the ones who think their lives don't matter?

Today was D-day at my company and 4 people (out of about 50-60 total) resigned. I think 3 were anti-science/doctor and likely at least a little political, and 1 was not (I don't know her politics but I believe she is may be total anti-vaxx/clean living/eating type).

I wish these people would stop going to the hospital.

If it's "just the flu," don't go to the hospital. Ride it out at home. That way the doctors can't kill you.

Most amazingly random moment: There's an influential disinformation club/group with exactly 25 active members (the one responsible for the terribly "save 3 but kill 2" antivaxx study retracted in record time). A german magazine (think The Atlantic) went to a hospital to interview doctors and speak to unvaccinated patients for a video report. And who just happens to be there ? One of those 25, a (surprise !) Economics Professor. In a country of 83 mio with 2000 hospitals and roughly 7500 in them with Covid. And the team had no idea.

It was perfect. Hope everybody eventually recovers, but until then it's the worlds smallest violin playing. And of course no rugrats from him. It helps, that (surprise !) his Homepage is also full of ugly shit on other topics from defending racist mass murderers to whining on and on about his rights as a white hetero male are stripped. (Plus a blog post where he already claimed to have beaten the "slightly annoying" disease in heroic fashion)

That's been around from the start. There was actually a brief point it was 'true' in the sense doctors had to trial and error the way to finding the best 'dosage' and timing and quite frankly judging where the attempt even made sense, as it is brutally taxing for the body (there is a reason the average age in ICU has always been 15+ years lower than average age of all dead).

My company announced vaccinations required by Nov.

They should have done it sooner but better late than never.

More power to them. Were they "terminated" or left voluntarily ... are they eligible for unemployment?

I assume HR, in companies mandating vaccinations, can ask the question "are you vaccinated, provide proof". Probably tougher for them to find next job.

Never heard this one. Had a good chuckle.

They resigned as far as I know. Today was decision day so I guess it could have played out - I'm not resigning today, go ahead and fire me. Not sure about unemployment. I heard a couple of them have made some noise about suing. Perhaps the end game is to take their sweet time looking for a job, sue, get a decent settlement that will pay for a 6 month vacation, and then find somewhere to work at their leisure.

Basically, Singapore even with its high vaccination rate is getting hit with Delta. Below says 88% but I saw something like 78+% but that might be due to tot pop vs elig pop. They are trying to figure out how to "live with Covid".

E3B1C256-BFCB-4CEF-88A6-1DCCD7666635

If 88% isn't enough to stop this sucker, what does that mean for "herd immunity"?

I think it means globally the economist has it right that the death count is way way higher than we’re being exposed to here in the states. Some countries are being decimated and it’s just not getting out news wise. 2022 might be the beginning of the crisis that we learn about in some foreign lands.


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We have a large school system in MD that is preparing to go beyond requiring "vax or test" for their employees, and to a full-on vax mandate. Hard to say how widespread this goes, but it does feel like the sneaky next frontier in the whole carrot/stick/shotgun debate we're having.

From what I've read, herd immunity isn't going to be effective because of the possibility of re-infections, breakthroughs, etc. It's a mitigating factor only. That's one of the reasons why I'm on the 'living with it' side much more strongly now that I was, say, a year ago; there are places in the world where we're never getting to 88%, and the virus is just going to keep circulating and mutating. Having it do enough to limit the amount of deaths/serious cases is likely the best-case scenario.

Agree. We'll learn to live with booster shots, treat it like a flu++, accepted the increased deaths, have better therapeutic treatments etc. and come to a new normal.

At a certain point (e.g. maybe when vaccination is available for < 12), masks will become voluntary everywhere except maybe on small enclose places like a plane.

Yeah, I think this is right. The positive aspect is that serious illness seems to be fairly rare with vaccinated people who contract the delta version. So, as long as people stay up on their vaccine (and boosters), the hospital impact should start to lessen.

And one group of people will suffer immensely

I’m not sure how to square that circle in the long run when the death and dismay remains contained mostly on one side of the aisle (according to everyone else except one person).

It’ll be at strange time in our country when the virus’s worst effects are segregated to that group while the other basically lives (with some exceptions).


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This is the part that's thorny IMO, vaccine fatigue. Do people keep taking it as much as they are now, or does it drop more to where flu vaccines are? Of course that will depend on how much the overall health situation improves.

Looks like < 12 is progressing along.

There was a theory that people had worse reactions to the shot if they already had covid previously? If true, I wonder if that applies to boosters, worse reaction because they had been previously vaccinated.

Pfizer’s Close To Seeking Approval For COVID-19 Vaccine In Kids 5 And Up

Back to my post #1 on 2/3/20, the NYT article said

FWIW, using worldometers and "per infected/cases"

For "per total population"

For excess deaths, Economist article estimated up to 18.5M for the world. It's behind a paywall so didn't get the US.


The mortality stats per total pop will worse without all the mitigations (lock downs, no travel and quarantines etc.) and vaccines. Not sure how to calculate without those factors.

But taken at face value, this is where we are to the best of my google-fu.

IMO, looking at it as "per total infected/cases" vs "per total US/World population" does change the perspective some.

For US counties, right now 6 of the top 10 highest Covid cases per 100,000 are in KY. Three are in TN, 1 in OK.

If you look at hospitalized per 100,000, top 3 are ND, then the next 4 are GA, followed by 3 in TX.

It just never even occurred to me to have "Nurses" on my COVID worries Bingo card but...

A hospital in upstate N.Y. said it’ll need to pause baby deliveries soon because 6 out of its 18 maternity nurses quit over a covid vaccine mandate and 7 didn’t say if they’d get their shots. They’d expected to deliver about 200 babies in 2021.https://t.co/eCJ0DlKZba

— John Yoon (@johnyoooon) September 13, 2021

...here we are, apparently. (As already noted in this thread more than once)

interested to see how long these lazy people can go jobless before they feel the squeeze

It's wild to me that some police, fire, nurses and other health care personnel aren't getting the vaccine. Given the number of potential infected people they get around - what is the logic in passing on the vaccine? Just seems reckless

I did see a stat recently that 7 out of 8 nurses are vaccinated so that is 87.5% which is well above the national average. If the rest of the country was at that level we would be much better off.

That is my wife's question. Given that is a NY mandate where are these nurses going to work? I'm guessing for some, they are a 2nd income and feel like they can do with out and hope it goes away.

Considering my experience with maternity and OBGYN nurses, this doesn't shock me at all

SI

I do think that we have a bit of "Man bites Dog" going on with reporting.

For instance, me, my wife, and my eligible kid all got vaccinated. And we haven't had any COVID problems. So I haven't posted about it. Why would I? You don't post about nothing. And I wonder how many millions of people are just not posting about nothing.

But every breakthrough infection or person who loudly quits over mandates is going to get noticed.

It seems hard to find good data versus trying to get a sense of what is happening through stories.

So I may have gotten into a phase 2 clinical trial developed specifically for transplant patients. Weighing up whether to do this now vs wait for Pfizer - the real trade off for me is with the clinical trial I will be very closely monitored for antibodies and side effects, and will know after a couple of months how effective it was, whereas Pfizer is probably safer but potentially not as effective and I would basically be on my own and relying on publicly available antibody tests to see if I had any protection - which have their own issues.

I don't think it really matters what job you have if you are convinced the pandemic isn't real, or isn't that big a deal, or that you only have a responsibility to yourself and will take your chances since you're healthy, young, protected by God, [insert reason/excuse here]. If you don't think you are going to get sick or can get sick, the number of people you are around becomes irrelevant.

Yeah, if you think this is just a cold, why do you care how many people you are around?

SI

I think it has to do with not trusting the vaccine itself. That seems to be the common thread with those not wanting it here, the protests that are also taking place in some European countries with health workers, etc.

Police and fire don't surprise me. Little surprised by nurses although I'm wondering how many of those were on the front lines of the pandemic and how many are like nurses at a podiatrist office.

Yeah, I'm not sure how many ER nurses can play the "this pandemic isn't real" card. I was more responding to the maternity nurses not getting one - you would think they would have seen some of this firsthand (esp in NY).

This hospital is near Syracuse so likely not the big spikes that happened so early in NYC.