Vaccines, Infrastructure, and Kids In Cages: US Politics April 2021

I think there's no need at the moment to get heavy handed with vaccine requirements. Once daily vaccine rates slow down or stop, if infection rates are still high, we need to start getting stricter.

The cards aren't perfect, they can be faked, but they are a start. Maybe you look for something better if things just continuing being bad for many more months.

Don’t worry, the county of Los Angeles has paid someone to make iPhone wallet card

You have to opt-in to get digital vax record. No app to download, just click on link. You'll be asked for name & DOB. If you have an iPhone, you can add it to Apple Wallet. Options in the works for people who got a shot outside of LA County. 2/ @KNX1070 pic.twitter.com/meL9ynmOvv

— Claudia Peschiutta (@ReporterClaudia) April 17, 2021

“Healthvana”

Get the Simon Belmont shot

I had to get an extra medical because I had too many!

yeah tbf coming from a country with a health-care system, and having traveled before, I didn't really need to tick off new ones - maybe just boosters for pertussis and tetanus?

if things just continuing being bad for many more months

the real problem is likely to be setting standards now when we're likely to see big spikes again in autumn as a) weather drives ppl inside, b) then-current variants roll their sleeves up, and b) initial vaccines start to wear off anyway.

gee, thanks!

Vaccines usually require boosters. Pfizer/Moderna offer at least six to eight-month protection. We'll get the booster then.

And Pfizer's CEO already said as much. It's like a flu shot.

Another endless pharma revenue stream. I can see where the conspiracy theorists are coming from. But also we have a lot of vaccines and medicines that have made life a lot better, so.

in short, big pharma is a land of contrasts

in a big pharma
streams stay with you

This ability of big pharma to create boosters for an ever-mutating virus that has killed millions of people worldwide is just about all that justifies its existence. As opposed to coming up with hair restoration products, anotherviagra-alike, or yet another slightly improved drug for psoriasis, irritable bowel syndrome, or overactive bladder that they can flog on television.

Totally. If we're going to have a multi-trillion-dollar pharmaceutical megalith, it ought to at least try to keep us alive.

also lol Alfred

Vaccines usually require boosters. Pfizer/Moderna offer at least six to eight-month protection. We'll get the booster then.

This is what I said! It's the minutiae of how "vaccine passports" (or w/e) are going to stay valid, in the midst of how the booster rollouts are going to be coordinated (while the initial vaccines are still likely below 75% takeup), and how up-to-date the boosters are going to be, that I see as complicated. Just showing your handwritten vaccine card rn is less than useless, given how forgeable they are.

If we don’t give New Yorkers making over $1 million a tax cut of $60k on average, poor disabled people don’t get in home supports and services. I’m glad Cuomo has his priorities straight https://t.co/NtWStD9UZU pic.twitter.com/uJS72QrHD9

— James Medlock (@jdcmedlock) April 19, 2021

"I had to get an extra medical because I had too many!"

extra medical what?

So far, any legal mandate for showing proof of vaccination in order to participate in normal daily activities in the USA is purely hypothetical. The chances it will be enacted nationwide seem to me extremely low, given the 50-50 split in the Senate. Attempting to enact it state-by-state would be so poorly enforced as to make such restrictions essentially voluntary. A well conceived, well run, well funded and well accepted program would certainly save lives and probably provide some protection against future surges of new variants, which is a foreseeable problem we're likely to be dealing with for another half-decade or more.

I don't foresee it happening and if it were attempted, I think it would almost certainly meet such resistance it would fail in its purpose. But talking about it is a hot-button political topic of the moment, so I guess we'll talk about it.

There's already testing required at lots of places. I imagine proof of vaccination will work as something like a fast pass. I know vaccinated people that have already traveled overseas, and if you didn't have proof of vaccination you need proof of a negative covid test from the previous 72 hours. No idea how liability might play out in all of this.

extra medical what?

― akm, Monday, April 19, 2021 12:33 PM (thirty-three minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

"medical" as in "medical examination"

I know vaccinated people that have already traveled overseas

sigh

Ayo, if you would like a real-world example of the "vaccine passport" idea to discuss, New York state is testing one right now: https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/04/08/vaccine-passport-new-york-excelsior-pass/

Just the idea of vaccine passports is controversial — Florida’s governor issued an executive order banning them — so it’s important to be clear about how New York is and isn’t using Excelsior Pass. The state’s guidelines require theaters, major stadiums and arenas, wedding receptions and catered events to screen customers for the coronavirus. Businesses can do that by confirming either your vaccination status or that you’ve had a coronavirus test in the past 72 hours.

When you show up at one of these businesses, you can bring your physical vaccination card from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention or a copy of a recent test result — or flash the Excelsior Pass that replaces both of those. The high-tech approach is voluntary, but providing proof of your coronavirus status to these kinds of businesses is not.

It's worth reading the whole piece if you're interested in stuff like privacy considerations, accessibility issues, scamming, and effectiveness.

this is the one a performance partner of mine is exploring
https://www.clearme.com/healthpass

I have to say, Excelsior looks less invasive to me than that, but I'm v strongly against mainstreaming biometric tech, not that there's much info on the site about how it works, where the images are stored, etc. I'm also suspicious of this:

"A CLEAR kiosk at the venue takes touchless temperature, integrating the result into the Health Pass. It’s the perfect add-on to enhance safety and streamline operations

Temp screening is totally worthless health-security-theater afaict and that's putting aside the effectiveness of touchless temp reading in the first place.

xpost If you are vaccinated, and you adhere to all guidelines and requirements (masks, tests, etc.), and the destination country has no problem with you arriving, should you not travel?

I feel like a negative test in the past 4 days or something is a much more useful barometer to fly than a vaccination card. You can be vaxxed and still theoretically contagious, or at least it's possible.

I mean, I have no plans to travel out of the country in the next few years, but uh... good luck getting vaccinated Americans not to travel.

also very curious about the reasons not to travel once fully vaxxed, as we're starting to plan a possible trip this summer.

The only trip we are planning is to rent a cabin in the UP for a week at the end of the summer, but that's pending where numbers are by then since our son is below the 12-15 range and is very unlikely to be vaccinated by that point.

I feel like a negative test in the past 4 days or something is a much more useful barometer to fly than a vaccination card. You can be vaxxed and still theoretically contagious, or at least it's possible.

I'd say you have a substantially higher likelihood of being contagious with a 4-day-old negative test than you do if you're vaccinated.

If you are vaccinated, and you adhere to all guidelines and requirements (masks, tests, etc.), and the destination country has no problem with you arriving, should you not travel?

tbc I'm just annoyed and jealous as I'm probably still months out from even booking shot the first

Heh, it annoyed/annoys me, too! We're not flying anywhere before December, but I really don't see why I wouldn't before then. If not now (full vaxxed) then when?

The only trip we are planning is to rent a cabin in the UP for a week at the end of the summer, but that's pending where numbers are by then since our son is below the 12-15 range and is very unlikely to be vaccinated by that point.

― soaring skrrrtpeggios (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Monday, April 19, 2021 12:59 PM (four minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

Just a heads up, you're likely going to find that mask compliance in the UP is somewhat less than what you've experienced in Chicago. Maybe this is obvious, I dunno, but I'm from up there and my parents still live there, so I hear stories and read news, etc. Depending on where you go you may be the only person masked up.

@ Simon H. --- fair!! i totally can appreciate that sentiment. fingers crossed for you.

Just a heads up, you're likely going to find that mask compliance in the UP is somewhat less than what you've experienced in Chicago. Maybe this is obvious, I dunno, but I'm from up there and my parents still live there, so I hear stories and read news, etc. Depending on where you go you may be the only person masked up.

I mean, nothing is set in stone at all yet. We're just all desperately in need of a trip to look forward to and a cabin within (longish) driving distance seems reasonable to plan four or five months out. Obviously if shit looks dire, we'll cancel. I mean, we wouldn't dare head up there right now with the numbers as they sit, but I'm hoping for a turnaround by then.

I was in marquette and houghton in the UP in the past month and it seemed like everyone in the former was wearing a mask while nobody in the latter was.

If you are vaccinated, and you adhere to all guidelines and requirements (masks, tests, etc.), and the destination country has no problem with you arriving, should you not travel?

Just using the US as an example, we only just hit 25% of the population fully vaccinated. That isn't even close to what we need for herd immunity, so unnecessary air travel is a terrible idea right now. The new case rate needs to be near zero before people start flying everywhere.

Maybe you're vaccinated, but A. new variants are popping up that you might either not be protected against or you can carry asymptomatically and B. the vaccines aren't 100%... they're awesome in terms of protecting you from hospitalization and mean we can hit herd immunity faster than we would with vaccines only 50-60% effective, but we need to see that herd immunity in full effect before going back to normal, and we just haven't got there yet.

I dunno, if the goal is herd immunity and zero cases, I imagine that rules out travel for ... a couple more years? Which seems pretty untenable.

I saw this Nature article on why herd immunity is likely impossible at this point:

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-00728-2

I mean, we probably are never hitting her immunity at this point, so I guess travel is just over forever if that's our benchmark.

"herd immunity"

we still need to know more about the risks that vaccinated people pose to the greater population, but it seems like an odd thing to fret over when a large portion of the country plans to remain unvaccinated and refuses to observe any semblance of masking or distancing whatsoever.

I dunno, if the goal is herd immunity and zero cases, I imagine that rules out travel for ... a couple more years? Which seems pretty untenable.

― Josh in Chicago, Monday, April 19, 2021 2:36 PM (four minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

the UK had one (1) death yesterday. it doesn't need to take two years.

f. hazel said we need herd immunity and

the new case rate needs to be near zero before people start flying everywhere.

2,963 new cases and 4 new deaths in the United Kingdom

And keep in mind, that's the UK, where you currently cannot travel to without a lengthy quarantine. How enforced it is, I dunno, but I think we're operating under the idea of "travel" as "travel that does not require a week+ in a hotel at your own expense."

the UK is planning to lift domestic restrictions pretty soon IIUC. not sure about inbound travel given the situation in the ROW. my point is more that you can set a pretty strict requirement to lift a given restriction and it's not impossible to reach it. (well, it might be in a country in which 25% of adults plan to refuse vaccination.)

I mean, we probably are never hitting herd immunity at this point, so I guess travel is just over forever if that's our benchmark.

Should we travel now? No, we should not. Is herd immunity a pipe dream at this point which will lead to all airplanes being grounded forever? I think that's pretty obviously a different question and involves a lot more conjecture. But this summer, vacations shouldn't involve flights.

xpost I didn't say impossible, I said years, if the standard is no new cases and herd immunity.

i understand. i'm saying that a rich country with access to vaccines could set an aggressive target for lifting all domestic restrictions (probably not zero, but small, like 5 per million or something) and that wouldn't be synonymous with "never lift this restriction" or "years" because they could reach it in the next few weeks.

the UK and israel (both now in the low tens per million) have in fact done this, and are going to succeed.

exponential growth goes both ways (or it does when there is effective healthcare and public health systems and hasn't been epistimic collapse).