Comment by rhino369 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by rhino369 | Hacker News Reader

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I'm not even sure this formula is WRONG. It's just not great for morale.

Residents are generally under 34 and in good heath. In the USA, only ~2400 people 34 have died from COVID--and that is mostly people with comorbidites.

In comparison about ~250,000 people over 55 have died.

You'd obviously have do account for life-years lost, risk of exposure [1], etc. I wouldn't be shocked if giving the vaccine to a 25 year old resident is a sub-optimal choice.

[1]Based on my MiL's experience (an ER doc), the risk of infection at a hospital is a lot lower than it used to be because they have PPE now. She's more worried about catching it from her son who works in an office. That said, they need to take into account risk of exposure and risk that the residents spread it to others.

I mean a surface level analysis would say that you've missed a critical datum if you're saying patient-facing staff should be left at risk of being incapacitated from their duties for up to a month.

That should definitely be a factor considered, especially in any area where a doctor shortage could occur. But a month sounds like a long time for <35 years olds in good health.

14 days is the quarantine period to show symptoms. It is not how long the infection takes to run its course if you actually have it, which is generally 3-4 weeks presuming things go well, which they much more frequently do not.

I mean, the hospitals are full. Staff are catching covid every day. The staff are getting patient sick, they're getting their famlies sick. The hospitals are shifting workers who don't normally work with Covid patients to start working half days with covid patients, ensuring as many people as possible get exposed.

There's simply no excuse for not ensuring everybody in the hospitals, then in clinics, gets the vaccine before anyone else in the offices and working from home.

Which makes them more likely to have low level symptoms while simultaneously spreading it further. This policy just doesn't make sense.

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