Negatory

Please do enlighten me, how do averages work? And what is your point? Also, remember that I specifically was talking about folks with a COVID death rate from 5-15% when this reply was created, so make sure to include only the ages that that statistic applies to. Show your work. Oh and if your point is that the death rate for each age is actually lower because there are fewer males than females at those ages, then I totally agree. Thanks, I just figured that would be lost so I just halfed it for y’all.

https://www.ssa.gov/oact/STATS/table4c6.html Doesn’t get to 4% until age 78. At age 70 it’s closer to 1.5%.

Meh, don’t play because you don’t like the framing of the questions. That’s fine. It’s wholly impossible to engage in debate of merits of ideas or philosophy when you quadruple down on an intentionally absurd black and white stance.

Here’s a more pointed devils advocate question, because you’re not actually answering my questions. Let’s imagine there is a new disease that just came out. You’re in charge of figuring out the response. Here’s the question: How many excess deaths should we accept? And the answer is not any unless you’re an anarchist, because I’ll just pose a hypothetical illness that kills 320M Americans as my example. Where obviously something like that would necessitate an extensive government reaction to stave off total societal collapse. The questions get a lot harder when they’re posed like this, which is why skeptics love to do it. Is it 1M excess deaths? Because we just got there. Is it 10M? Is COVID specifically okay because it just doubles to triples the mortality of old people? They are unanswerable, and asking people to describe very specific “lines in the sand” is unreasonable. When it comes down to it, it’s all based on feelings on both sides.

To play devils advocate, you don’t get to ask that question and not have the same thrown back at you. You’ll find it’s equally difficult to answer. What level of annual mortality risk are you willing to accept? Are you good with a 5-15% mortality risk for a highly contagious disease for those over the age of 70ish? If not, what mortality risk do you think is good? Should we let the disease spread freely throughout our society? Or do you think there should be any attempt to slow the spread? Is a 1-2% risk of mortality for those over 60 okay? What level of hospitalization of Americans are you comfortable with? How many months of cancelling elective surgeries and minor medical care are you comfortable with? I think most people went into this with good intentions. Decrease the absurdly high risk that some demographics would be literally decimated, somehow. I think we’ve now effectively done that and should call this complete, but my point is that it’s not easy to put an effective bounds on what the goals should be from either viewpoint. As absurd as it is that Fauci is arguing he thinks we should potentially wear masks ad infinitum, it’s also absurd in my view that some people - some of them on this forum - think we should have done nothing ever. There’s a balance.

We’ll just have to wait and see on cases. I am certain we’ll hit 1.0M, although many of those cases won’t be tested. Probably see 600-700k confirmed cases a day is my bet, with 40-60% not detected due to either being asymptomatic or mild. In the spirit of keeping up with the science, preliminary data used in studies shows that while Omicron is super contagious, it is significantly less bad from an individual outcome perspective. Maybe this will be a blessing to finally get everyone immunity, whether you want it or not. https://mynorthwest.com/3289906/uw-modelers-project-3-billion-new-covid-19-cases-by-february/ “UW researchers said the omicron hospitalization rate is between 4 and 10% that of delta, and that the fatality rate is 1 to 3% that of delta.” Also, rates like that - up to 10-20 times less likely to be hospitalized or 30-100 times less likely to die - make it almost false reporting to even call this disease COVID. Because it is not very similar to Delta. Legitimately, if these estimates turn out to be true, it will be significantly less bad for an individual than the flu. Only question is, will the hospital system in America be able to deal with 60-140M people getting “the flu” in the next few months?

I don’t know why, but this thread being locked and then reopened with this crap has really hit a nerve. I’m tired of these “points” that aren’t points. Are we ever going to acknowledge facts and actually debate policies based on reason opposed to emotion? Are we going to talk about things like reasonable age based policies or rotating geographic protections? Are we ever going to actually acknowledge that the real risk is somewhere in the middle of “0.00007%” and “everyone is at significant risk?” Are we going to talk about risk based policies that actually take into account things like BMI, race, or health status to more effectively deal with this pandemic? Are we going to discuss policies to actually temporarily deal with the increased real hospital risk over time in a population if we do have a large infection? Are we going to discuss the high chance that Omicron actually will max out hospitals again even with vaccines based on its extremely high infection rate and ability to evade previous immunity? About how it’s almost a mathematical certainty we will approach 1.0M cases per day in the next week? Or are we going to keep posting politicized, debunked talking points on both the liberal and conservative sides and then argue about how they’re wrong when we’ve had these discussions 10 times already? Whether that’s folks on the left not acknowledging the significantly diminished effects of the vaccine on transmission/infection or folks on the right posting bs talking points like you just did - it’s all fuckin stupid. But, just as you would say “Orange man bad” to condense an actually intricate thought into a BS political viewpoint, I guess I could just summarize your post as “Brandon XD lol”. I’m reminded of a good ole saying that generally holds true - definitely in these debates: “The amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude larger than is needed to produce it.” But let’s look at his “points.” https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandolini's_law 1) 0 religious exceptions have been passed - so what? This is a question literally just to generate outrage, but not logically. We’ve addressed hypocrisy here in other threads, and I don’t think it was successfully refuted, but I guess if you keep saying that religious exemptions should be approved then by golly I guess they should be. 2) Him asking why the FDA didn’t explicitly recommend the vaccine is irrelevant when the CDC explicitly does recommend it. Oh, why didn’t he mention that? Intentionally misleading to split hairs between gov organizations to make it seem like the government doesn’t have a stance 3) The vaccine has been highly politicized, resulting in orders of magnitude higher reporting than for previous vaccines. This is literally just how politics appears in statistics - its comparing tomatoes to apples. I agree that there are potentially mildly increased risks of myocarditis for young males - but that’s not his point. He is saying that there are blanket increased rates of adverse events - which isn’t true, it’s just total numbers. 4) Bullshit trying to mislead people about Comirnaty generic vs brand when they are chemically identical and the government treats them legally the exact same. But he didn’t want to mention that? This is maybe the dumbest argument that armchair lawyers love to cite. 5) Only looking at deaths is intentionally misleading when we’ve seen that COVID can make things like carrier or submarine readiness questionable based purely on sickness, outbreaks, or long term effects. You had COVID? It takes you out for a few days. Oh and don’t forget that 10-30% of folks that had COVID have long term effects on their neuromuscular, digestive, respiratory, or cardiovascular systems. But we can ignore that. We can ignore everything but deaths, right? By the way, you’re also required to be vaccinated against rubella and the flu, which are significantly less bad from every aspect, yet where are the complaints? Also, quick question, how many marines have died from Rubella? And I’m done here. It has taken me 10 times the energy to halfway refute this dumb video that has “legitimate questions.” Every singe one was intentionally misleading, largely fallacious, and irrelevant. I honestly look forward to this guy and similarly misguided folks like him that spout BS on social media in uniform getting their well-deserved discharges as they intentionally disrupt good order and discipline. To end this rant on an even more sarcastic note, make sure to listen to Donald Trump’s recent direction to go get your booster.

I think most people support personal religion up to the point where folks abuse and cherry pick their core values to use religion as a trump card (pun intended) to do whatever they want and impact others. See gay marriage, abortion, COVID, abortion etc. I don’t even agree with mandates for the whole population, but trying to pursue religious exceptions come off as one of the most disingenuous “You can’t make me!” temper tantrums possible - not a genuinely held belief.

It is overly simplistic to say that all humans are innately religious. I’m not, and I think you’ll find that is true for many others.

Unbridled libertarian policies that prioritize individual liberty over all else sound good until you implement them. Just like socialist policies. It’s why unbridled capitalism in the 1800s HAD to be regulated, for example. I am of the opinion that there should be a balance of individualism and collectivism in an ideally functioning society. I believe your viewpoint is unrealistic for the same reason that I believe a communist viewpoint is unrealistic. If individuals are not expected, even to the smallest extent, to make sacrifices for the good of their country or countrymen - in any case - what is the point of that society? See also: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons

I know you, specifically, want COVID to be over. You can tell by how every about 3 weeks you post that you personally are over it. Cool. But you lack ability to provide a coherent fact based argument or use statistics, which significantly hurts your point. If 1 out of 100 people die in a population die due to a disease it is not a 1% death rate. It would only be 1% if 100% of the population got the disease. Currently, they’re estimating that only about 50-100M people in the US (15-35% of the population) have had COVID, which means it is more like a 3-7% death rate in that population. Incoming “Doesn’t change anything.” Tell me, what sort of mortality or long term effect is worth vaccinating society? I’d like to set the stage, before you answer. Polio has about a 1 in 200 chance of causing paralysis. In those cases 5-20% of the population dies. So the overall mortality risk for polio is less than 0.1%. Also, you probably know, we are approaching double the total casualties of WWII. Same comment. Your statistics are intentionally misleading and wrong. There’s about 212M folks in the 0-49 age range. There have been 52.8k deaths. That right there is a .024% chance of death. Oh wait, not everyone was infected, as previously talked about, so in reality it’s closer to .075-.15% chance of death. I can still buy that maybe that’s acceptable, but we’re talking you being off by a factor of at least 100. For those 50-64, there’s about 62M people. There have been 145k deaths. That is 0.2% of the population. Which means a CFR on the order of 0.6-1.2%. Population size source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/241488/population-of-the-us-by-sex-and-age/ COVID deaths source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/1191568/reported-deaths-from-covid-by-age-us/ All of your guys’ analysis also conveniently ignores the fact that over 80% of those infected by the disease have a long term symptom or side effect: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-021-95565-8 I am all for having a debate about whether blanket vaccine mandates are useful, or what the cutoff is. But I am not at all interested in BS statistics, lies, or just plain feelings, which is what significantly reduces both the effectiveness and credibility of the anti vaccine side’s arguments.

Which is why your point is asinine. 800k people have perished. 1 out of every 100 folks over the age of 65. With most of the cases being mild. https://dnyuz.com/2021/12/13/as-u-s-nears-800000-virus-deaths-1-of-every-100-older-americans-has-perished/

Cool. Always nice to be reminded of why society is ultimately going to fall apart. You think in the golden ages of America people said stuff like this? I’m all for people having informed opinions and not getting vaccinated, but supporting people just being assholes is stupid.

Hope so, but we probably need to wait and see. If you remember, this is what everyone said back in 2020 as well.

That's unironically a good point. The "there's not enough data" argument has very little evidence behind it. I think getting away from feelings-based arguments is in everyone's best interest.

Careful trying to use math as your high horse, because there is actually validity in what Ratner is saying from a mathematical perspective. Marginal changes in R0 for an extremely infectious disease do not significantly affect the ultimate end state. This is because a population is limited, so exponential growth is ultimately only possible at the beginning. And logistic limiting effects are basically unimportant until a huge amount of society has been infected. This is due to the fact that, even with masking and vaccines for the entire population, the vaccine would spread with an R0 well greater than 1. That’s what actually matters. None of this feel good, I have less likelihood to give COVID to my kids when they are at home, bs. The truth is, they’ll just get it in the future. In reality, with an R0 estimated around 5, with vaccines that are 50% effective (many studies dispute this and estimate it closer to 10-30%), you’d still need masks and social distancing to be close to 60-70% effective. Good thing the CDC, in internal modeling, estimates masking effectiveness around 20-30%. For a good summary, just read the delta predictions on the last source below. Bottom line is that it is nigh impossible to stop this with the vaccines we have. Sources: R0 of Delta: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34369565/ Vaccines are not that effective after a short period of time: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02689-y Masking efficacy is estimated at 20-30%: (page 20) In reality, all that these mandates do (for a shot that is not as effective as we wish it was) are draw out the inevitable - most of the population will get infected at some point. If hospitals are fine - and they ARE right now, from a national perspective - what’s the benefit to society of the blue curve vs the red one? Yeah, people are going to die. But there actually isn’t much you can do about it, and most of it really is their own choice as to whether they want to be vaccinated or not. We should do what we can to “flatten the curve” to a level that is sustainable from a healthcare perspective. The vaccine has been extremely effective in reducing hospitalizations and death for society to a sustainable level. Curve: flattened. If we’re sustainable now, then we have won. Mandates aren’t going to help society any more, and instead will only serve as a tool to continue politicization of the masses. The only thing that would actually work is having people stay home and actually limit contact - a la China - but we’ve seen the disastrous effects of that policy on both the economy and society. Juice isn’t worth the squeeze.

To be clear, a 38% vs 25% is more like 50% more likely to be infected. Just like if it was 10% vs 1% it wouldn’t be 9% - it’d be 1000%.

Yep, sure have. Basic training and tech school. More to follow, probably. https://www.usnews.com/news/national-news/articles/2021-11-02/how-the-military-is-handling-troops-who-refuse-coronavirus-vaccines?context=amp

Yeah. When you put it that way, f$&% that. I’m not interested in being a pawn in another failed war like Vietnam. At the same time, if we don’t use our military for things like this, it begs the question as to what’s the point of even having the military we have? Do we only exist to police Iran/N Korea/etc?

That is like 5% of the total force. Time to do more with less I guess.

I think you really only need to look at the USS Theodore Roosevelt to invalidate almost all of these arguments. They can just apply the lessons learned from that experience to basically any potential combat scenario and, bam, everyone in the military must be vaccinated. In this case, does nuance of one's opinion really matter?

I can agree with this for children. At least I can agree that the evidence supporting the need to get vaccines for healthy youth is shaky. But do you guys support boosters for those over the age of 50 or 60? Boosters for those with BMIs > XX? Maybe boosters for those with certain immune issues? Because there are very little actual analytical or data based reasons not to other than political propaganda says to be a pain in the ass to the “liberal” branch of society. Thats the main issue with a lot of this conversation. Many folks on here are taking absolutely indefensible black and white stances (no boosters whatsoever, no shots whatsoever!) with no justification other than their political circle wouldn’t like it disguised with an “I don’t feel like it.” Also, it’s a fallacy to say that an argument is incorrect (some people should get boosters) just because they said something else that may not be true (it’s imperative for children to be vaccinated). You don’t get to conveniently ignore all of the evidence of science or experts or whatever just because you disagree with one conclusion.

I talked personally with Gen Moseley about this ~10 years ago and think it was genuine. But everyone is entitled to their opinions. Agree with everything you said about Bob.

One example: Gen Moseley fell on his sword for the F-22.

Duh, it’s to defend your god given right to buy an iPhone for $1000 as opposed to $2000. The price of outsourcing important manufacturing.