Poll of the Day > The point of LOCKDOWNS is to NOT Overwhelm HOSPITALS. Does it make sense to you?

(+) Yeah! (+)

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

Not if if the net result is negative.

Sure. But if the hospitals are less swarmed, then that's a positive...

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

That's up to the individual. Though that choice is made significantly harder after the lockdown weakens the economy.

I meant to say, "Obviously, you can still go to the hospital if you need medical care." And the choice is only harder for some people. People who understand how important health it will usually go when they need actual medical care...

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

It also damages the economy, worsens the mental health of people, reduces social cohesion. induces anxiety, and possibly more.

Maybe. But just spreading a virus around without a care in the world is also harmful. And if we all work together to try to reduce the virus, then lockdown like this won't be necessary. But when people fight the lockdown, it causes the lockdown to not only last longer, but to possibly have to be enacted again. Nobody likes the lockdown. But it is needed. Like how not many people like to work, but that's one of the main ways to make money... Sometimes, you have to do things you don't like...

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

They aren't in hospitals and therefore not triggering the lockdown.

And? They still deserve some of the blame for passing on the virus, causing others to have to go to the hospital. Hence, they are helping to trigger the lockdown. That's like saying a person who got shot is at fault for taking up a hospital bed, but the person who shot them doesn't take aby of the blame. Just like the person who shot another takes some of the blame for putting someone else in the hospital, the person who passed on the virus is at blame for putting someone else in the hospital...

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

Again, the spread isn't the triggering variable.

The spread is part of the trigger variable. If people weren't spreading it, then less people would have it meaning the lockdown wouldn't be needed. I feel like that's pretty easy to understand... Spreading it is, at the very least, causing the triggering variable...

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

We're talking about people who have refused medical treatment. Treating a person without their consent is medical battery.

Then they should stop a bad person and stay home... That's also something simple they could do...

BEERandWEED posted...

@Metalsonic66

2 weeks out of 4, on average, qualifies as a few days since based on how variant an individual women's fertility might be.

Ovulation is the time when inception is most likely, not the only time it is possible. Which is what you originally claimed.

Do you even understand human anatomy?

The irony of you asking this is LMAO

LinkPizza posted...

Sure. But if the hospitals are less swarmed, then that's a positive...

But is it enough of a positive to offset the negatives?

LinkPizza posted...

And the choice is only harder for some people.

The negative effects of lockdowns make it harder for everyone. Except maybe the exceptionally wealthy who won't notice.

LinkPizza posted...

But just spreading a virus around without a care in the world is also harmful.

We're talking about lockdowns. According to the first post spread doesn't trigger them. Hospitalization do. You can have spread without hospitalizations.

LinkPizza posted...

That's like saying a person who got shot is at fault for taking up a hospital bed

And? In this topic the person who got shot is less important than the hospital bed.

LinkPizza posted...

Then they should stop a bad person and stay home...

Bad people have been common since the beginning of civilization. Lockdowns have not been common until recently.

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

There has been lots of rhetoric blaming the unvaxxed for the continued restrictions. Including those that never had symptoms to seek treatment for.

Because the unvaxxed are largely driving the continued spread of the disease, including giving it opportunities to evolve vaccine resistance.

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

Then they sought medical treatment and what I said still applies.

Yes, people seek medical treatment when they are dying, usually in an effort to not die. That's... not really a "gotcha" in any way, shape, or form. I'm not sure what point you think you're making by saying that.

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

Thinking like that is the subject of this topic.

It's really not. You have completely misunderstood what's being discussed if you believe that it is. "Hospitals are overwhelmed" does not mean "doctors are sad because they're so busy, but they can avoid that by just turning patients away" (though doctors are sad because they're so busy; this whole ordeal has been a massive strain on pretty much everyone in health care). It means "people are going to die because they can't access the treatment they need."

BEERandWEED posted...

The "facts" surrounding covid are very different from actual facts.

The "actual facts" that... you've made up because they sound nice? Or have you just decided that the truth is unknown but definitely can't be whatever anyone's actually saying about the disease's progress because you don't like that and therefore won't believe it? You're not exactly presenting robust, well-substantiated arguments here. Your position largely amounts to burying your head in the sand any time anyone presents actual data/reasoning and screaming "it doesn't matter God will save me," a claim which is especially silly given that people of any religion actually have a higher Covid mortality rate on average than non-religious people.

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

You can have spread without hospitalizations.

Not on any meaningful scale. We're discussing public health policy here, which goes far beyond "this one guy spread it to this other guy and neither of them ended up in hospital." If you get spread on a large enough scale to make the risk of extreme random variation negligible, you're going to end up with people in hospital because of it (or at least, people that will die or be permanently injured if they aren't hospitalized, since you seem to want to consider "just don't go to the hospital" to be a viable alternative).

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

But is it enough of a positive to offset the negatives?

I believe so. Not everyone will feel the same, though... Because the hospital being less swarmed means that altogether, less people are in need of medical assistance. And the ones that do need it can get it. And get more attention to help them, rather than a paced hospital that can barely give even a few minutes to each patient since they have so many... So, I think it is enough of a positive to offset the negative...

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

The negative effects of lockdowns make it harder for everyone. Except maybe the exceptionally wealthy who won't notice.

And the negative effects of the virus makes things harder for people, too...

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

We're talking about lockdowns. According to the first post spread doesn't trigger them. Hospitalization do. You can have spread without hospitalizations.

The spreading absolutely triggers them. If it spreads to more people, then more people go to the hospital. That causes hospitals to be swarmed. And that causes the lockdown. Ergo Spreading cause the lockdown...

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

And? In this topic the person who got shot is less important than the hospital bed.

And? That still means the person who spread the virus is still at fault. Whether the person is more or less important than a hospital bed doesn't change matter, nor does it change what I said...

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

Bad people have been common since the beginning of civilization. Lockdowns have not been common until recently.

Lockdowns weren't needed as much until recently. Hence why they are common. Which should be obvious using common sense...

adjl posted...

Therapists have phones. Problem solved.

It occurs to me there's something you don't understand. They expect you to pay for that shit. The restrictions don't just create social anxiety, they harm the economy. A damaged economy means people can't afford that shit. Then there's the matter of trying to get insurance to pay for that shit. Even before the pandemic my insurence was getting declined because the company hadn't been paying the claims for other patients who had been treated.

adjl posted...

Because the unvaxxed are largely driving the continued spread of the disease, including giving it opportunities to evolve vaccine resistance.

Sounds like that's only a problem for people who have symptoms.

adjl posted...

It's really not. You have completely misunderstood what's being discussed if you believe that it is.

I believe the same of you. You have failed to fully consider the premise of this topic and have made arguments which disregard how another statement relates to that premise.

adjl posted...

"Hospitals are overwhelmed" does not mean "doctors are sad because they're so busy, but they can avoid that by just turning patients away"

You quoted that like it was something that had been said. You're ignoring my actual statements in favor of something easier to argue against.

"Hospitals are overwhelmed" could mean the staff is overworked. It could mean resources are deplete. It could mean there there aren't enough beds. It does not mean there's too many asymptomatic people.

adjl posted...

since you seem to want to consider "just don't go to the hospital" to be a viable alternative).

I'm saying don't have lockdowns. But if it's hospitalizations that trigger them, then don't blame the people who aren't hospitalized.

LinkPizza posted...

I believe so.

I don't. I hold that lockdowns have a greater detrimental effect on people than hospitals have a beneficial effect to them. So having lockdowns to benefit hospitals in the hopes of that benefit carrying over to people is self defeating.

LinkPizza posted...

And the negative effects of the virus makes things harder for people, too...

Something like 40% of people who tested positive were asymptomatic. There are people who never had a reason to get tested. There are people who tested positive and only had a mild case. These people did not need to be hospitalized. The effect of the virus on these people was none at all to a mild inconvenience. The negative effects of the virus do not apply to everyone. The negative effects of lockdowns do apply to everyone due to economic and societal impacts.

LinkPizza posted...

Lockdowns weren't needed as much until recently.

I argue they aren't needed now. They only make the situation worse.

adjl posted...

Because the unvaxxed are largely driving the continued spread of the disease, including giving it opportunities to evolve vaccine resistance.

*Omicron laughs*

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

Sounds like that's only a problem for people who have symptoms.

The number of whom will increase as total infections increase. There's no version of this where there's an increase in case counts that consists entirely of asymptomatic people. If you increase total cases by 10%, you increase symptomatic cases by 10%, you increase hospitalizations by 10%, and you increase deaths by 10% (within reasonable margins of error). I don't know why you're focusing so much on "some of them will be asymptomatic" as though that means some of them won't, but it really doesn't.

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

"Hospitals are overwhelmed" could mean the staff is overworked. It could mean resources are deplete. It could mean there there aren't enough beds. It does not mean there's too many asymptomatic people.

In this context, it means hospitals can't keep up with demand. Nobody's suggesting that it means there are too many asymptomatic people.

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

I'm saying don't have lockdowns. But if it's hospitalizations that trigger them, then don't blame the people who aren't hospitalized.

If you can figure out a way for any given infected person to choose not to end up being hospitalized, that's a great philosophy. Heck, you'd single-handedly solve the pandemic if you figured that out, and possibly all of medicine.

The problem is you can't. It is correct that people who are not being hospitalized are not overwhelming hospitals (obviously), but whether or not a given case develops into a hospitalization is a complete crap shoot. You can't predict it, nor can you control it (aside from the fringe case of choosing to die at home instead of seeking medical aid, which is such a vanishingly small portion of cases that it can be safely neglected). Therefore, anyone that creates a risk of increasing case numbers also creates the risk of increasing hospitalizations.

Now, the nature of probability means some people are going to cause clusters that don't end up resulting in hospitalizations, which I think is what you're trying to get at. That is, however, nothing more than sheer dumb luck, which is not something anyone should be relying on as a matter of personal philosophy, and certainly not as a matter of public policy. You can't rely on post-facto knowledge of a decision's ultimate consequences to help make the decision. Time only moves in one direction. Instead, you have to analyze the risks to make predictions about what harm can be expected, then act based on those.

Quite simply, more cases=more hospitalizations. With a small enough sample size, you'll encounter instances where that relationship doesn't pan out, but public policy has to be based on the bigger picture.

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

I hold that lockdowns have a greater detrimental effect on people than hospitals have a beneficial effect to them.

Hospitals are responsible for several metric buttloads of people not being dead. While I don't doubt that suicides, overdoses, and other mental health-related deaths have increased over the course of the pandemic, at least partially driven by lockdowns, I do doubt that they're increased by enough to offset the number of lives saved by keeping case numbers lower (both in terms of deaths and in terms of ensuring hospitals still have the capacity to handle the patients that need treatment). If you want to claim that they have, you're going to need to quantify that.

SunWuKung420 posted...

*Omicron laughs*

Yes, Omicron is indeed an example of Covid evolving vaccine resistance. Thank you for confirming my point.

adjl posted...

Yes, Omicron is indeed an example of Covid evolving vaccine resistance. Thank you for confirming my point.

Just like antibiotic resistant strains didn't come about due to people who didn't take antibiotics, since it happened from over use of antibiotics, vaccine resistant strains didn't come about due to those that didn't get the vaccine. Stop spreading incorrect information.

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

I don't. I hold that lockdowns have a greater detrimental effect on people than hospitals have a beneficial effect to them. So having lockdowns to benefit hospitals in the hopes of that benefit carrying over to people is self defeating.

I disagree. I think people being able to be treated in hospitals when they need to be in a good things. And if the lockdowns help with keeping hospitals from getting overwhelmed like they are, which they will, then thats good I think people not being treated because the hospitals are overwhelmed in more detrimental effect of people than being stuck at home for a certain amount of time

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

Something like 40% of people who tested positive were asymptomatic. There are people who never had a reason to get tested. There are people who tested positive and only had a mild case. These people did not need to be hospitalized. The effect of the virus on these people was none at all to a mild inconvenience. The negative effects of the virus do not apply to everyone. The negative effects of lockdowns do apply to everyone due to economic and societal impacts.

You realize that 40% on people being a symptomatic is bad, right? Thats part of the reason the lockdowns are actual kind of important And it doesnt matter how much of an inconvenience it is to them. This lockdown is to help EVERYBODY. And those same people will start crying as soon as it does inconvenience them. Like taking a loved one away. Its already happened so many times. Instead of worrying about how sad youll be because you can go party, you should worry about people as a whole. People dying or being hospitalized (especially in a hospital with no room) is worse than missing out on party or whatever And the negative effects of the virus dont effect everyone until they do. Many people didnt have the negative effects affect them at first. Then they had a family member who died from it, or caught a different variant that did affect them. Youre just a selfish person. Thats your problem You dont care about anybody, which is why you dont want a lockdown

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

I argue they aren't needed now. They only make the situation worse.

I disagree. I think trying to slow down the spread of a disease and keep hospitals less full for when people need to go there is a good thing.

SunWuKung420 posted...

Just like antibiotic resistant strains didn't come about due to people who didn't take antibiotics, since it happened from over use of antibiotics, vaccine resistant strains didn't come about due to those that didn't get the vaccine. Stop spreading incorrect information.

Resistant strains aren't created by the things they resist. They mutate randomly, then end up with a competitive advantage because the non-resistant strains are selected against. A basic understanding of probability tells us that the more cases exist, the more likely it becomes that one of them ends up randomly evolving resistance. That means we can blame the emergence of resistant strains on those that are keeping case rates high. In Omicron's case, it was then transported by the vaccinated, as they were the only ones travelling, but it remains true that being unvaccinated, refusing to wear a mask, refusing to distance, or otherwise being unwilling to participate in the fight against Covid increases the risk of variants emerging in the first place by increasing overall case rates.

It's also worth noting that, unlike antibiotics, immunity from vaccines provides no greater selective pressure in favour of resistance than immunity from a natural infection. Antibiotics are specific compounds that interfere with the growth of bacteria, which the bacteria would not otherwise be facing if the patient weren't taking them. Vaccines provide mostly the same antibodies as a natural infection, though, so if you're taking the position that vaccination has created a vaccine-resistant virus, you must also hold the position that naturally-acquired herd immunity would have presented the same risk.

I can believe adjl incorrectly believes that resistance isn't gained through exposure and resisting the effects of that exposure.

SunWuKung420 posted...

I can believe adjl incorrectly believes that resistance isn't gained through exposure and resisting the effects of that exposure.

Would you care to explain the mechanism by which penicillin rewrites the genome of bacteria to create penicillin-resistant bacteria? Since you seem to understand it so well, I'm sure that would be a valuable educational experience for all of us.

adjl posted...

Would you care to explain the mechanism by which penicillin rewrites the genome of bacteria to create penicillin-resistant bacteria? Since you seem to understand it so well, I'm sure that would be a valuable educational experience for all of us.

https://www.cdc.gov/drugresistance/about/how-resistance-happens.html

"increases in antibiotic resistance are driven by a combination of germs exposed to antibiotics"
"their (antibiotics) use can contribute to the development of resistant germs. Antibiotic resistance is accelerated when the presence (or exposure) of antibiotics pressure bacteria and fungi to adapt."
"germs develop defense strategies against antibiotics (after exposure) called resistance mechanisms. DNA tells the germ how to make specific proteins, which determine the germs resistance mechanisms."

I asked you a specific question. That link does not provide an answer to my question. By what mechanism does penicillin (or any other antibiotic, really, penicillin's just a very well-known example) rewrite the genome of bacteria to create penicillin-resistant bacteria?

One has to question why Sunny keeps continually posting on a board that hates him so much. And he tries to lecture us about doing things that are unhealthy for the mind.

adjl posted...

I don't know why you're focusing so much on "some of them will be asymptomatic" as though that means some of them won't, but it really doesn't.

So, some people being asymptomatic does not mean some people won't be. Good. That invalidates your "If you increase total cases by 10%, you increase symptomatic cases by 10%" argument.

adjl posted...

Nobody's suggesting that it means there are too many asymptomatic people.

Yet they get the negative effects of a lockdown all the same. Why should they be effected when the virus alone is harmless to them?

adjl posted...

If you can figure out a way for any given infected person to choose not to end up being hospitalized

I have, that person refuses treatment.

adjl posted...

I do doubt that they're increased by enough to offset the number of lives saved

Lockdowns effect a larger scale than that of people who need hospitalization. The effect of economic and societal impacts will also persist longer than their immediate medical needs.

LinkPizza posted...

I think people not being treated because the hospitals are overwhelmed in more detrimental effect of people than being stuck at home for a certain amount of time

You do realize I'm thinking in broader terms than being stuck at home for a certain amount of time, right? I'm looking at the long term effects well beyond the amount of time they are stuck at home.

LinkPizza posted...

You realize that 40% on people being a symptomatic is bad, right?

No, that means the virus alone is harmless to them. The only bad thing about it is that it's not closer to 100%. Which would render the virus harmless to everyone and there would be no concern over it's spread.

LinkPizza posted...

Instead of worrying about how sad youll be because you can go party, you should worry about people as a whole.

I clearly am by looking at the long term effects. The detrimental aspects don't end when the lockdown is lifted and someone can attend a party.

LinkPizza posted...

Youre just a selfish person. Thats your problem You dont care about anybody, which is why you dont want a lockdown

I care about people in a different way than you do. I want them to have a good quality of life. I think the current situation would be improved if more people had the attitude that they'll live how they want or die trying. I see no point in prolonging life if that is denied to them. I don't want lockdowns because I care about people. Wanting lockdowns because other people should take responsibility for your health is the position of a selfish person.

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

Lockdowns effect a larger scale than that of people who need hospitalization. The effect of economic and societal impacts will also persist longer than their immediate medical needs.

Covid has killed more people than both world wars. And if you locked down properly, there wouldn't be a need to do it properly now. There's only long term problems because you insist on not following proper procedure.

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

I think the current situation would be improved if more people had the attitude that they'll live how they want or die trying.

They want to live a long time so choose to isolate, they don't need to risk death as that's moronic. You're welcome to go live in the wild to live how you want and die trying but it's not anybody else's responsibility.

You fail to realise that if people had that fatalistic view, there would be people gunning down anti-vaxxers to kill off the spread so life can start working again. You are not some lone martyr of the people, you're the antagonist in people's lives.

Kyuubi4269 posted...

anti-vaxxers to kill off the spread so life can start working again.

You are erroneously attributing the spread to the non-vaccinated. The vaccinated are also spreaders.

BEERandWEED posted...

You are erroneously attributing the spread to the non-vaccinated. The vaccinated are also spreaders.

That is the case because the anti-vaxxers kept the virus to mutate. When the anti-vaxxers die, the mentally well people can isolate for a couple weeks and come out to a clean world.

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

So, some people being asymptomatic does not mean some people won't be. Good. That invalidates your "If you increase total cases by 10%, you increase symptomatic cases by 10%" argument.

What aren't you understanding here? If 50% of cases are asymptomatic, 50% are symptomatic, 10% get hospitalized, and 1% die (hypothetical numbers for easy math), and you have 10,000 cases, you're going to have 5,000 asymptomatic, 5,000 symptomatic, 1,000 hospitalized, and 100 dead (give or take reasonable margins of error). If you have 20,000 cases, you're going to have 10,000 asymptomatic, 10,000 symptomatic, 2,000 hospitalized, and 200 dead (again, give or take).

The odds don't change. If you increase your sample size without changing the odds, you increase the number of "successes" (in this case, hospitalizations) proportionally. That's basic math, and I don't know why you're so hung up on the existence of asymptomatic people as though they invalidate basic math. In order to reduce overall hospitalization rates, it is necessary to reduce overall case rates. That's going to be true no matter how many cases are asymptomatic or otherwise don't need hospitalization.

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

Yet they get the negative effects of a lockdown all the same. Why should they be effected when the virus alone is harmless to them?

Because it's impossible to determine that until after they've already been infected for 2+ weeks, by which point it's far too late to make any decisions on the matter. Infection control policies have to be proactive, otherwise they can't do anything.

Moreover, asymptomatic people can still infect others, so even if they personally don't need hospitalization, going about their business while infectious is likely to create further hospitalizations. This is a matter of public health, not personal.

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

I have, that person refuses treatment.

That does not happen on any meaningful scale and can be safely ignored. Even if it did, unless that person is also choosing to isolate (effectively enforcing a lockdown on themselves), they risk infecting others and hospitalizing them
.
SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

Lockdowns effect a larger scale than that of people who need hospitalization. The effect of economic and societal impacts will also persist longer than their immediate medical needs.

Death lasts infinitely longer than any economic/social impacts ever will.

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

I care about people in a different way than you do. I want them to have a good quality of life. I think the current situation would be improved if more people had the attitude that they'll live how they want or die trying. I see no point in prolonging life if that is denied to them. I don't want lockdowns because I care about people. Wanting lockdowns because other people should take responsibility for your health is the position of a selfish person.

Aiming to live life to its fullest isn't a bad philosophy, but it needs to be tempered with some common sense so you aren't taking unnecessary risks. You're not going to jaywalk across a busy six-lane road to save the few minutes it would take to walk to the nearest lights/crosswalk, because that would be stupid. Similarly, you're not (at least I hope you aren't) going to drive through a red light with a dozen pedestrians mid-crossing to save yourself a minute of waiting, because that time saved isn't worth the risk to their lives. Those are extreme examples, clearly, but they illustrate the bottom line that there are limitations on how far that mindset should be taken.

Should the entire world be placed under house arrest indefinitely for the sake of containing the virus? No. That would be unreasonable and probably wouldn't even work that well even if you could figure out the logistics of it all. Should the entire world spend a few months limiting their physical contact with others to only what's essential in order to get case numbers under control, then gradually resume normal activity levels with a few extra precautions in place to make sure cases don't explode beyond what can be handled by their local health care system (reinstating restrictions as needed to control any large spikes)? That's a better approach.

Kyuubi4269 posted...

Covid has killed more people than both world wars.

Covid's bad and all, but it very much has not. The global death toll to date is 5.44 million, WWI killed ~40 million, WWII killed ~80 million. Covid's on roughly the same scale as the Holocaust, which killed somewhere between 4 and 7 million.

Kyuubi4269 posted...

And if you locked down properly, there wouldn't be a need to do it properly now. There's only long term problems because you insist on not following proper procedure.

I certainly won't deny that many parts of the world could have done a much better job of locking down, but the idea of a perfect lockdown that eradicated the virus within a month was never anything more than a fantasy. The logistics involved in making that possible are just too far beyond any government, let alone actually enforcing it well enough to have the desired effect.

BEERandWEED posted...
You are erroneously attributing the spread to the non-vaccinated. The vaccinated are also spreaders.

The unvaccinated are more likely to be infected, more infectious once they are infected, and remain infectious for longer. A disproportionate amount of the spread can absolutely be attributed to them (at least, pre-Omicron). Not all of it, certainly, but given that anti-vaxxers are also generally more likely to ignore masks, distancing, and gathering restrictions, there's a lot to blame them for.

Quite simply, this is a war against Covid, and Covid claims anyone that doesn't fight against it for its own side. If you're not with us, you're against us.

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

You do realize I'm thinking in broader terms than being stuck at home for a certain amount of time, right? I'm looking at the long term effects well beyond the amount of time they are stuck at home.

And Im looking at the long term effect this disease has on people Which isnt actually good

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

No, that means the virus alone is harmless to them. The only bad thing about it is that it's not closer to 100%. Which would render the virus harmless to everyone and there would be no concern over it's spread.

Its harmless to them (Or they at least think that). But that means they can easily spread it without them, or anyone else, noticing. Everybody having weaker symptoms that were noticeable, but didnt put you out on your ass for a couple weeks would be better than asymptomatic And not only that, but I heard it could still be doing damage to you body. Just unnoticeable damage So, 100% asymptomatic would be worse as peoples bodies would be getting damaged, and nobody would know

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

I clearly am by looking at the long term effects. The detrimental aspects don't end when the lockdown is lifted and someone can attend a party.

Yeah. But I think not being able to go to the gym or out to a party is better than people dying and spreading disease for those things. You can still leave the house for work, essentials, and stuff. But you cant just go to social events, gyms, and stuff like that

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

I care about people in a different way than you do. I want them to have a good quality of life. I think the current situation would be improved if more people had the attitude that they'll live how they want or die trying. I see no point in prolonging life if that is denied to them. I don't want lockdowns because I care about people. Wanting lockdowns because other people should take responsibility for your health is the position of a selfish person.

I also want people to have a good quality of life. But they need to be alive for that. And the best way to keep them alive is to stop spreading a virus. And stop helping it mutate by slowing down or stopping the spread. Because you cant have a good quality of life if youre not even alive Thats one of the requirements And of everybody had gotten onboard from the beginning, things would be a lot different So, I want lockdowns because I care about people. And about them being able to live by actually being alive And Im not wanting lockdowns for somebody else to take responsibility of my health. I want lockdowns so everybody can help everybody else. You saying thats selfish is just you trying to pass the buck again. If you spread the virus to someone else, that is partially your fault. Whether you knew you had it or not. Everybody shares in the blame. All youre doing is trying to pass the blame to other people. Thats selfish, and you know it

adjl posted...

Quite simply, this is a war against Covid, and Covid claims anyone that doesn't fight against it for its own side. If you're not with us, you're against us.

As yes, there is that super destructive us vs. them mentally that has always been so useful.

BEERandWEED posted...

As yes, there is that super destructive us vs. them mentally that has always been so useful.

In an actual war, it's more than just a mentality. It's the reality of the situation. You're choosing to side with the enemy. Don't be surprised when that earns you some animosity.

The fact that you are creating some fictional pro-covid human faction in your head proves how dangerous your rhetoric is.

BEERandWEED posted...

The fact that you are creating some fictional pro-covid human faction in your head proves how dangerous your rhetoric is.

Absolutely nothing about it is fictional. Those who choose to do nothing to stop the virus' spread are actively aiding it. That's the nature of viruses. There can be no neutral position here.

Therefore, I ask you: Why do you side with Covid?

On another note:
@SunWuKung420
adjl posted...

I asked you a specific question. That link does not provide an answer to my question. By what mechanism does penicillin (or any other antibiotic, really, penicillin's just a very well-known example) rewrite the genome of bacteria to create penicillin-resistant bacteria?

Do you have any intention of answering this question? If you don't know, I encourage you to simply say that, since this is a good educational opportunity. There's no shame inherent in ignorance, only in trying to pretend that you know more than you do.

The only pro-covid humans are those profiting from it.

@adjl

I sufficiently answered your question, it just wasn't pedantic as fuck like you.

SunWuKung420 posted...

The only pro-covid humans are those profiting from it.

Damn, I should have thought of that. Makes total sense.

Kyuubi4269 posted...

That is the case because the anti-vaxxers kept the virus to mutate. When the anti-vaxxers die, the mentally well people can isolate for a couple weeks and come out to a clean world.

Another person who incorrectly thinks vaccine resistance formed in the unvaccinated. That's not how developing resistance works.

SunWuKung420 posted...

@adjl

I sufficiently answered your question, it just wasn't pedantic as fuck like you.

No, you answered a different question in a manner that left out one very key fundamental piece of the puzzle (which, incidentally, is precisely the piece I asked you about): Where do the resistance genes come from?

SunWuKung420 posted...

The only pro-covid humans are those profiting from it.

So everyone else that's fighting for it has just been conned into lending their efforts to a cause they don't realize they're fighting for, allowing somebody else to profit from it? Good to see you're developing a bit of self-awareness, but you've still got a ways to go.

SunWuKung420 posted...

thinks vaccine resistance formed in the unvaccinated

there's a larger chance of it forming in the unvaccinated. it is then selected for by the vaccinated. it takes both of these things: a place for the virus to roam free + a selection pressure.

personally I see this as inevitable though. the vaccine is just not effective enough. people can complain about the unvaccinated, but it's not like we can just achieve absolutely 100% vaccination rates. it's always going to be asymptotic. USA has something like over 76% vaccination rate. and then, the vaccine resistant strains are not emerging from USA anyway as far as I know. it was not ever possible to vaccinate the planet in less than a year. and incomplete vaccination will inevitably result in vaccine resistant strains. I don't see how things could be different.

Sahuagin posted...

there's a larger chance of it forming in the unvaccinated

That's not how developing a resistance works. The virus developed a resistance due to the presence of a vaccine not from the lack of presence, therefore, the resistant strain developed in the vaccinated population.

Sahuagin posted...

USA has something like over 76% vaccination rate.

62%, and even that's a relatively recent development. For quite a while it was stagnating slightly over 50.

Sahuagin posted...

it was not ever possible to vaccinate the planet in less than a year. and incomplete vaccination will inevitably result in vaccine resistant strains. I don't see how things could be different.

Mostly, with better compliance with other infection control protocols and a more conservative approach to relaxing those restrictions in response to vaccination rates (read: relaxing restrictions based on case rates, not vaccination rates), overall case rates would be lower, resulting in fewer total variants and therefore less risk of resistant ones. The risk would still be there, of course, but those that haven't cooperating all along have definitely increased it.

SunWuKung420 posted...

That's not how developing a resistance works. The virus developed a resistance due to the presence of a vaccine not from the lack of presence, therefore, the resistant strain developed in the vaccinated population.

How do vaccines introduce new genes into the viral population? I don't know how else I need to phrase this question for you to understand that there's a glaring hole in your understanding of the situation, and saying "they just do" doesn't fix that. if you don't know, just say that, and I'll be happy to help you learn. Otherwise, you're just a walking embodiment of the Dunning-Kruger effect.

SunWuKung420 posted...

The virus developed a resistance due to the presence of a vaccine not from the lack of presence

what do you mean by "develop"? the virus will "develop" resistance to anything (anything possible) randomly, it just won't catch without the selection pressure.

using the slotmachine analogy, the virus thriving among unvaccinated populations are pulls on the slot machine arm (each spawning virus is a pull), and the presence of the vaccine is the "winning combination". if the virus is not thriving somewhere, then there are greatly reduced numbers of "plays"; if there is no vaccine then there is no "winning combination", and even if that combination is found it just doesn't take hold.

you need both things for it to work: thriving in one population while also being exposed to the vaccinated. we basically created this perfect situation by vaccinating most but not all of the world.

adjl posted...

62%, and even that's a relatively recent development. For quite a while it was stagnating slightly over 50.

k I was just doing total doses / 2 / pop, but I guess there are a lot of booster shots. ~21% are triple dosed and ~74% are (at least) single dosed. actually the way they word it sure makes it confusing... the actual distribution is:

26% unvaccinated
12% 1 dosed
41% 2 dosed
21% 3 dosed

(I don't know if this takes into account that J&J only needs 1 dose)

(incidentally Johns Hopkins is reporting over 2 trillion doses administered world-wide??? that has to be a mistake right? that's an average of 250 per person world-wide?)

adjl posted...

overall case rates would be lower, resulting in fewer total variants

maybe, but where? the variants are not emerging from USA afaik. they emerged from like India and South Africa or something, and then came to USA.

I think you would really have to block international travel to not end up where we are. even if USA was fully vaxed, things would not be different. there are countries like Isreal that were highly vaccinated almost right away but it doesn't matter if the virus is still running rampant somewhere else and travel is not restricted.

I don't see that it is possible for the world to have been sufficiently vaccinated fast enough to prevent this. this is the inevitable outcome. all we can do is continue trying not to spread it, try to maximize vaccination rates, lockdown if/when the health system starts to reach capacity. unless you have nearly every person in the world cooperating, which cannot happen, there is no ending this.

Sahuagin posted...

what do you mean by "develop"? the virus will "develop" resistance to anything (anything possible) randomly, it just won't catch without the selection pressure.

It's not random. All creatures (humans, animals, bacteria, virus) have survival mechanisms allowing them to survive by adapting to environmental pressures.

SunWuKung420 posted...

It's not random. All creatures (humans, animals, bacteria, virus) have survival mechanisms allowing them to survive by adapting to environmental pressures.

ok... and what is the mechanism in this case?

SunWuKung420 posted...

It's not random. All creatures (humans, animals, bacteria, virus) have survival mechanisms allowing them to survive by adapting to environmental pressures.

And where does that ability come from? Or do you believe that every species magically came into existence already possessing genes that allow it to respond to every threat the world can possibly throw at it (including those that do not yet exist)?

Furthermore, why are you acting like vaccine resistance (or technically, vaccine avoidance, since viruses generally don't actively resist immune responses so much as they dodge them by evolving new surface proteins) is in any way specific to vaccines? Vaccines do not interact directly with viruses. What viruses interact with (and therefore develop resistance to) is the immunity that vaccines provide, which is generally the same immunity that natural infection would give. A virus is just as capable of evolving resistance to natural immunity as it is to vaccine-based immunity.

Sahuagin posted...

k I was just doing total doses / 2 / pop, but I guess there are a lot of booster shots. ~21% are triple dosed and ~74% are (at least) single dosed. actually the way they word it sure makes it confusing... the actual distribution is:

26% unvaccinated
12% 1 dosed
41% 2 dosed
21% 3 dosed

I'm just going by https://ourworldindata.org/covid-vaccinations?country=USA, which says 62% fully vaxxed (though I believe that just indicates that they've had the pair of shots (or single, in J&J's case), not that the two weeks to achieve full vaccination have passed). That's what the infographic Google presents upon searching "US Covid vaccine" cites, which I'm generally okay to work with.

Sahuagin posted...

(incidentally Johns Hopkins is reporting over 2 trillion doses administered world-wide??? that has to be a mistake right? that's an average of 250 per person world-wide?)

That must indeed be a mistake. Our World in Data is saying 9.81 billion, which is much more believable.

Sahuagin posted...

maybe, but where? the variants are not emerging from USA afaik. they emerged from like India and South Africa or something, and then came to USA.

No VoC's have emerged from the US, no. Alpha was UK, Beta was South Africa, Delta was India, Lambda was Peru, and Omicron was blamed on South Africa (but was almost certainly circulating in many other countries already, South Africa was just the first one with enough integrity to report on it and we're not really sure what the origin was). It wouldn't surprise me if other variants have, but just haven't been noteworthy enough to get attention (there are clearly several greek letters unaccounted for between Alpha and Omicron), but I don't know for certain and am only speculating when I say that.

That said, the US' high case count does put it at considerable risk of generating variants, so the irresponsible behaviour of the unvaccinated can be criticized on that basis.

Sahuagin posted...

I don't see that it is possible for the world to have been sufficiently vaccinated fast enough to prevent this. this is the inevitable outcome. all we can do is continue trying not to spread it, try to maximize vaccination rates, lockdown if/when the health system starts to reach capacity. unless you have nearly every person in the world cooperating, which cannot happen, there is no ending this.

It won't last indefinitely, no, but that doesn't mean the risk can't be reduced more than it has been to delay that inevitability until more people can be vaccinated/become immune and the risk becomes even less. All of this boils down to risk management, so while there are no guarantees, that doesn't mean nothing can be done.

Boom.

Yes. If people avoided large gatherings and only travelled when necessary, the virus would be less likely to spread.

@SunWuKung420

adjl posted...

And where does that ability come from? Or do you believe that every species magically came into existence already possessing genes that allow it to respond to every threat the world can possibly throw at it (including those that do not yet exist)?