COVID

[davegin]

What I stated was directly from Fauci, non edited, on this mornings Meet the Press, which was live. Note that the station broadcasting this is a liberal media outlet. What I see you stating above is much different than your former 80-90% protection claim. One of the problems with any of the numbers used in regards to this disease is that they change constantly at the whim of those in charge. The only real proof of effectiveness or side effects will come from long term testing and usage. We will all be dead before this research is over.

PS: Both of your sources refer to a CNN interview. Everyone is aware of CNNs credibility. It has none.

 

[aiabx]

What I see you stating above is much different than your former 80-90% protection claim. One of the problems with any of the numbers used in regards to this disease is that they change constantly at the whim of those in charge. The only real proof of effectiveness or side effects will come from long term testing and usage. We will all be dead before this research is over.

What I said:

vaccines are providing 80-90% protection against infection

What the Ontario Ministry of Health said:

Following the second dose, VE (vaccine effectiveness) increases to greater than 85%.

Does that really qualify as "much different"?
Look, I'm glad no one you know has been killed or badly affected by COVID. You're lucky. That is not true for me or for many others. To me, you're sounding like the guy who pulled the trigger on the revolver and when it didn't fire, concludes there are no bullets in it and you're wondering why we're bugged when you point it at us and pull the trigger.

 

[davegin]

What I said:


What the Ontario Ministry of Health said:



Does that really qualify as "much different"?
Look, I'm glad no one you know has been killed or badly affected by COVID. You're lucky. That is not true for me or for many others. To me, you're sounding like the guy who pulled the trigger on the revolver and when it didn't fire, concludes there are no bullets in it and you're wondering why we're bugged when you point it at us and pull the trigger.

You keep saying: I'm lucky. Well I have ten siblings, three sons, nine grandchildren, countless nephews and nieces with kids of their own, a large circle of friends in the construction field, have been to six ASL FTF gatherings in the past year and a half with between 16 and 30 attendees at each, yet neither I nor any of these others have had a personal experience with this virus or know of anyone who has. Of course, being over 70 as well as most of the aforementioned being above 60, I cannot say that there hasn't been health issues. There have. But none attributed to Covid as some diagnose flu and colds as just that, not something politically popular. If it was just me, maybe luck would have something to do with it. But when the group is this large, it probably isn't luck. It's natural.
I believe the vaccines were rushed and not properly vetted. I believe it is about money and politics. We've had much more deadly diseases come our way and none have gotten the fear going quite as much, and the cures took decades or more. The health organizations has been so back and forth on this that they have lost any credibility and it's almost as if they have to doctor numbers in order to attempt to not look bad.
To me, you seem like the guy who pulls a water pistol on me and then is surprised when thinking it is real, I shoot you.
I am glad that you are healthy and doing whatever you feel necessary to stay that way. But to me, life is too short and too precious to waste not living it.
BTW: I am a second amendment guy and support the rights of gun owners. However, I don't now or have ever owned a gun. Mainly because I know I would, in some cases, use it. And I don't want to be in that situation.
Also, I trust the Ontario Ministry of Health about as much as I trust WHO and the CDC. Politicians, regardless of whether they have medical degrees. It's always about the money.

 

[davegin]

You keep saying: I'm lucky. Well I have ten siblings, three sons, nine grandchildren, countless nephews and nieces with kids of their own, a large circle of friends in the construction field, have been to six ASL FTF gatherings in the past year and a half with between 16 and 30 attendees at each, yet neither I nor any of these others have had a personal experience with this virus or know of anyone who has. Of course, being over 70 as well as most of the aforementioned being above 60, I cannot say that there hasn't been health issues. There have. But none attributed to Covid as some diagnose flu and colds as just that, not something politically popular. If it was just me, maybe luck would have something to do with it. But when the group is this large, it probably isn't luck. It's natural.
I believe the vaccines were rushed and not properly vetted. I believe it is about money and politics. We've had much more deadly diseases come our way and none have gotten the fear going quite as much, and the cures took decades or more. The health organizations has been so back and forth on this that they have lost any credibility and it's almost as if they have to doctor numbers in order to attempt to not look bad.
To me, you seem like the guy who pulls a water pistol on me and then is surprised when thinking it is real, I shoot you.
I am glad that you are healthy and doing whatever you feel necessary to stay that way. But to me, life is too short and too precious to waste not living it.
BTW: I am a second amendment guy and support the rights of gun owners. However, I don't now or have ever owned a gun. Mainly because I know I would, in some cases, use it. And I don't want to be in that situation.
Also, I trust the Ontario Ministry of Health about as much as I trust WHO and the CDC. Politicians, regardless of whether they have medical degrees. It's always about the money.

Also: earlier in this post I asked a series of what I believe to be pertinent questions. I have had no reply on even one of them. Why?

 

[Actionjick]

You keep saying: I'm lucky. Well I have ten siblings, three sons, nine grandchildren, countless nephews and nieces with kids of their own, a large circle of friends in the construction field, have been to six ASL FTF gatherings in the past year and a half with between 16 and 30 attendees at each, yet neither I nor any of these others have had a personal experience with this virus or know of anyone who has. Of course, being over 70 as well as most of the aforementioned being above 60, I cannot say that there hasn't been health issues. There have. But none attributed to Covid as some diagnose flu and colds as just that, not something politically popular. If it was just me, maybe luck would have something to do with it. But when the group is this large, it probably isn't luck. It's natural.
I believe the vaccines were rushed and not properly vetted. I believe it is about money and politics. We've had much more deadly diseases come our way and none have gotten the fear going quite as much, and the cures took decades or more. The health organizations has been so back and forth on this that they have lost any credibility and it's almost as if they have to doctor numbers in order to attempt to not look bad.
To me, you seem like the guy who pulls a water pistol on me and then is surprised when thinking it is real, I shoot you.
I am glad that you are healthy and doing whatever you feel necessary to stay that way. But to me, life is too short and too precious to waste not living it.
BTW: I am a second amendment guy and support the rights of gun owners. However, I don't now or have ever owned a gun. Mainly because I know I would, in some cases, use it. And I don't want to be in that situation.
Also, I trust the Ontario Ministry of Health about as much as I trust WHO and the CDC. Politicians, regardless of whether they have medical degrees. It's always about the money.

I don't want to get involved in this discussion but will add the following. My cousin's husband and three relatives on her father's side of the family died from covid. It is definitely affecting some families.

 

[BattleSchool]

Chris - to say the Barrington Declaration is controversial would be a great understatement. I would not put myself or others at risk by taking their claims at face value.

I'm not sure how you would be putting yourself and others at risk by following their advice, which was centered on protecting the most vulnerable. By deciding not to attend ASLOk, you have made a determination that any contact you might have with ASLOk participants could result in you infecting vulnerable people in your local community. I don't think Gupta, et. al. would have a problem with your decision. More likely, they would applaud your efforts.

5 failings of the Great Barrington Declaration | Queen's Gazette

The Conversation: The Great Barrington Declaration's advocacy for naturally acquired herd immunity to COVID-19 amounts to a global chickenpox party: naive and dangerous.

www.queensu.ca

This is rich.

1. It creates a false dichotomy.

The declaration rhetoric offers a false choice between a wholesale return to our pre-pandemic lives (which is objectively dangerous) versus a total lockdown (which no one advocates).

Characterizing the GBD position as rhetoric, implying insincerity on the part of the authors made me immediately question the sincerity of Archer's counterarguments. GBD didn't call for a "wholesale return to" a "pre-pandemic" state of affairs. It called for targeted protection of the most vulnerable, and made a number of suggestions with regard to protecting the elderly in care homes. And despite Archer's claim that no one was advocating total lockdowns, the record speaks for itself.

2. The Barrington declaration gives oxygen to fringe groups.

The signatories did not intend to support such fringe groups, but their rhetoric invalidates public health policy and feeds the 19 per cent of North Americans who don’t trust public health officials.

There's that r-word again. This is weak argument against a public health policy proposal that is based not only on previous experience dealing with SARs and influenza, but also on plans to deal with future pandemics, plans developed since 2003 and 2009, but ignored. These plans focussed on containing or slowing the spread of the virus, isolating and treating the infected, and protecting the most vulnerable with targeted measures. For instance, school closures were one of the public health measures listed in the event of a severe influenza outbreak, because children are especially at risk. By the time the declaration was published, health authorities had a good understanding of who was and wasn't at risk from Covid-19, and kids weren't one of them. Yet schools were closed anyway. I wouldn't characterize myself as a 19-percenter, but I can see why some would question public health officials, if only because of the contradictory messaging over the course of the pandemic.

3. The Barrington declaration puts individual preference far above public good.

The declaration advocates that, “individual people, based upon their own perception of their risk of dying from COVID-19 and other personal circumstances, personally choose the risks, activities and restrictions they prefer.”

If these views were applied to traffic safety, chaos would ensue as we each chose our own speed limit and which side of the road to drive on. Public health matters, and the approach of the declaration to place ideology over facts helps fuel the pandemic.

This is disingenuous. The statement isn't ideological. It's simply reiterating the right of adults to have a say over their own health care, that individuals can make their own assessments with regard to what risks they take with their own lives. Nowhere does the declaration give licence to individuals to put the most vulnerable at (greater) risk. Under the GBD, the most vulnerable were to be isolated, and those directly responsible for their wellbeing carefully screened and tested. Sticking with Archer's traffic-safety analogy, there's nothing to stop a mask-wearing motorist from exceeding the speed limit. Instead, we rely on most people being responsible most of the time. Given the overwhelming adherence to public health restrictions in western nations to date, Archer was fueling mistrust.

4. The declaration misunderstands herd immunity.

Herd immunity occurs when a large enough proportion of the population has immunity, usually more than 70 per cent. Viral spread is then slowed because the virus largely encounters immune people. Herd immunity can be safely achieved by vaccines, but in order to “naturally” develop herd immunity, people must first survive the infection.

Given what was known about the virus in November 2020, when the rebuttal was published, herd immunity had already been underway for more than six months. Because many infected with Covid-19 were asymptomatic, we have no way of gauging exactly how many people had been infected to date. Moreover, by October, when the GBD was published, it was clear that deaths from the disease were almost exclusively among the elderly and those with certain co-morbidities such as obesity, diabetes, and cardio-vascular conditions. (Of 999 Covid deaths in Australia to date, almost 97 percent were 60 or over.) Finally, Gupta argued in a recent podcast that had authorities focussed on the most vulnerable from the beginning, including dispensing vaccines to the most vulnerable first--regardless of age, many lives could have been saved. She went so far as to say that she would have preferred to see her doses of the vaccine go to someone more vulnerable than her.

5. The declaration offers no details on how it would protect the vulnerable.

In Ontario, more than 60 per cent of COVID-19 deaths have occurred in residents of nursing homes and long-term care (LTC) facilities. COVID-19 is imported into LTCs from the community by relatives and health-care workers, so we must prevent viral spread in the community to keep these vulnerable people safe.

The experts have spoken: ...

On the contrary, Kulldorff, Gupta, and Bhattacharya made specific recommendations wrt to how to safeguard the elderly, regardless of where they live:

GBD

Para 7 Adopting measures to protect the vulnerable should be the central aim of public health responses to COVID-19. By way of example, nursing homes should use staff with acquired immunity and perform frequent testing of other staff and all visitors. Staff rotation should be minimized. Retired people living at home should have groceries and other essentials delivered to their home. When possible, they should meet family members outside rather than inside. A comprehensive and detailed list of measures, including approaches to multi-generational households, can be implemented, and is well within the scope and capability of public health professionals.

I don't think proponents of the GBD were (or are) asking anyone to take any claims at face value. Their premise, as I understand it, is based on the global health policies and plans developed in the wake of SARS. To my knowledge, none of these plans involved "lockdowns," certainly no stay-at-home orders as we have witnessed.

I'm not buying Archer's claim that GBD is guilty of spreading an "infectious bad idea." Their proposals were based on a hypothesis, just as the models that have been used to justify unprecedented public heath measures were based on a hypothesis. But Archer's position on the matter seems clear enough:

The experts have spoken: ...

The latest numbers I have seen from the World Health Organization is that vaccines are providing 80-90% protection against infection, and vaccinated people who are infected have vastly reduced effects. So if I lived alone on a mountain, I would come down from it to play ASL in Cleveland. But I don't. That 10-20% chance of getting infected, even if I don't suffer ill effects, still puts my friends, family and neighbours at greater risk than they need to be. I do know people with compromised immune systems. I do know people who are over 70. I do know people who cannot be vaccinated for legitimate reasons. I'm not going to put them at risk for the sake of a boardgame. I'm comfortable in the company of other fully vaccinated people.

As Gupta explains, unlike the vaccine for measles, the Covid vaccine doesn't provide permanent, or in some cases even temporary, protection from infection, and little if any from transmission. What the Covid vaccine does do is reduce the severity of the disease, allowing people to survive an infection and develop a resistance to the virus. IOW, even if the entire world population were vaccinated tommorow, vaccination would not eliminate Covid. And given the talk about a "booster" shot, "herd immunity" may not be such a bad idea after all.

I'm not comfortable in the company of people who have decided that their "freedom" is worth putting me and my community at greater risk. I've lost enough people in my circle from this pandemic, I'm not going to lose more by my own neglect. So I will not be attending ASLOK this year.

You are free to make your own decisions wrt your own health and that of others close to you. However, I don't think it's fair to claim that other's are putting their freedoms ahead of yours. They have not made you attend ASLOk against your will. Nor have they denied you access to vaccines. To suggest that there is a malicious disregard for your personal wellbeing is a bit much.

 

[Stewart]

The 10-20% possibility of infection is a fallacy.
Certainly if that were the prevailing rate with NON vaccinated individuals, the entire planet would've been exposed to the virus. With that rate and the rate of everyone you meet mingling with everyone else, there is no possibility that you HAVEN"T been exposed to the virus. The vaccine minimizes the contraction and if you DO get the virus a 90+% chance of only having mild symptoms..i.e. out of the hospital....
So, with 100% exposures you have about a 1% chance of getting some symptoms of the virus

But I understand everyone's concerns. You are more likely to get the flu.
And if you've smoked all of your life, then you also increase risks...these are our life choices we make....

This is just one more.

 

[davegin]

Just a side note: Is the "vaccine" really a vaccine in the medical sense? I was under the understanding that it is an mRNA delivery platform which exposes the body to genetic material. That would not actually qualify it as a vaccine. Vaccine is a term to make this injection more palatable to the general public.

 

[Michael R]

Just a side note: Is the "vaccine" really a vaccine in the medical sense? I was under the understanding that it is an mRNA delivery platform which exposes the body to genetic material. That would not actually qualify it as a vaccine. Vaccine is a term to make this injection more palatable to the general public.

Who cares, as long as it works.

 

[davegin]

Who cares, as long as it works.

The jury is still out on that.

 

[Michael R]

Not my jury.

 

[davegin]

Not my jury.

So then by nature of your reply, you really don't care if it works or not and are not interested in any proof for or against, I understand now.

 

[STAVKA]

Not my jury.

A herd of sheep? I got the dog for them.

 

[aiabx]

I am incapable of providing proof that the COViD pandemic is not a big conspiracy between the WHO, CDC, Canadian Health Ministries, the Chinese Communist Party, Pfizer, Dr Fauci, the Queen of England and the Gnomes of Zurich. If you're that deep into conspiracy theories, there's nothing I can do.

Please don't eat the horse dewormer.

(And yes, it is a vaccine. mRNA vaccines against corona viruses have been under development for many years. The cool thing about them is that they are a template - once the basics are there, you can quickly swap in the code for whatever specific virus you need to build antibodies for and you're ready to go. And it works. Probably the greatest medical miracle since the discovery of antibiotics.)

 

[STAVKA]

I am incapable of providing proof that the COViD pandemic is not a big conspiracy between the WHO, CDC, Canadian Health Ministries, the Chinese Communist Party, Pfizer, Dr Fauci, the Queen of England and the Gnomes of Zurich. If you're that deep into conspiracy theories, there's nothing I can do.

Please don't eat the horse dewormer.

(And yes, it is a vaccine. mRNA vaccines against corona viruses have been under development for many years. The cool thing about them is that they are a template - once the basics are there, you can quickly swap in the code for whatever specific virus you need to build antibodies for and you're ready to go. And it works. Probably the greatest medical miracle since the discovery of antibiotics.)

A vaccine that big pharma take no responsibilty for if you turn ill.

 

[hongkongwargamer]

Also: earlier in this post I asked a series of what I believe to be pertinent questions. I have had no reply on even one of them. Why?

You gotta know it's a problem when "your own side" doesn't even think it's worth the few minutes in their lives to answer your questions. (They should know the answers!). Think about it.

 

[hongkongwargamer]

So .. how about this ASLOK thing?

Personally I don't think it's worth my and especially my family/ friends/ my opponent's lives over playing boardgames, especially when I know the attitude of some of the attendees.

 

[hongkongwargamer]

So then by nature of your reply, you really don't care if it works or not and are not interested in any proof for or against, I understand now.

You should understand. You are exhibiting the attitude you described.

 

[STAVKA]

You should understand. You are exhibiting the attitude you described.

The swine flu vaccine is up for grabs , did you take it?

A massive amount of people are suffering from that vaccine fiasko for life.

 

[hongkongwargamer]

The swine flu vaccine is up for grabs , did you take it?

A massive amount of people are suffering from that vaccine fiasko for life.

While we are off topic....

McD's new Dairy Mike McFlurry is up fro grabs, did you try it?

A massive amount of people are enjoying that dessert for the summer.

On another note:

ASL is a communal event where people come together to play and to socialise.

COViD is a communicative disease that affects not only an individual but all those that we come into contact with: loved ones, friends, neighbours, innocent bystanders and even fellow GameSquad people.

Seeing the kind of attitude displayed in forums such as this where it's apparent that certain fellow attendees absolutely do not care about the welfare of anyone else in attendance does nothing to encourage participation.

The last thing I want to do is to condemn anyone to sickness or to death by boardgames. Or worse: innocent 3rd parties who didn't even get to play those games!