Vaccine passports would create a hideously divided two-tier society | Hacker News Reader

Vaccine passports would create a hideously divided two-tier society

telegraph.co.uk

11 pointswalterbell10 comments

From what I can read before the paywall I don't know what they even mean. Isn't Covid vaccination free in UK? How does this hit "disadvantaged" people? And what's the difference to the usual vaccination requirements for certain destinations?

Now what I can see is that people who cannot get vaccinated for health reasons are disadvantaged by this. But I'm not sure that's the demographic that wants to go to the mentioned nightclubs.

The real two-tier society split is between the people who profit from the crisis and the ones being lied to and scammed even further.

> But no one has really bothered to ask who the unvaccinated are. The Spectator’s data team has looked at the NHS database to find out. Britain’s racial disparity is worse than America’s. Some 16 per cent of white people in Britain have not been jabbed, but this figure stands at almost half for black people and a third for South Asians. Similar trends can be seen worldwide, with complex and much-debated causes (such as trust in authority). This vaccine gap shows no sign of closing. You can say that this is maddening, illogical, dangerous. But unless it changes, be in no doubt: vaccine passports would be a tool of discrimination likely to “whiten up” any venue in which they are deployed.

> Then comes poverty. Vaccines are popular in Britain’s prosperous areas but become less so the further down the income scale you go. The poorest 20 per cent in Britain are almost three times more likely to be unvaccinated than the richest (a figure that has never been published, let alone discussed). Again, let’s be in no doubt about who’d be most likely to end up out in the cold: people in the poorest communities who already get the worst deal from the health service.

https://web.archive.org/web/20210805212124/https://www.teleg...

In the UK a higher percentage of people in ethnic groups live below the poverty line, but in real numbers there are many time more poor white people, as the UK is 90% white. That means that someone living in poverty in the UK has a 6 in 7 chance of being white.

Poorer areas might have worse health services, but people in those areas tend to also live more unhealthy lifestyles which is the realthat lifespans in those areas tend to be lower than more affluent areas.

Being poor isn't the reason people in these groups aren't getting vaccinated; it's out of choice driven by ignorance or fear; as it's free to be vaccinated. The groups your mention are often are less educated and have cultural conflicts with medical and scientific advice.

Many communities have willfully ignored public health advice simply because they think it doesn't apply to them.

Good rhetoric, but the actually correct verb is "show", "display" or something. The income gap was there already, all the vaccine passport does is show it, and even in a manner that's easily subverted.

Anyone who wants to have a posh vaccine passport can get one easily and at no cost, so as a class marker it's really rather subversive. Posh clothes cost real money, a posh accent is difficult to fake, a posh vaccine passport is neither.

The columnist doesn't like the income gap, and protests against the least reliable, most easily subverted signifier?

More fact than rhetoric.

> The income gap was there already, all the vaccine passport does is show it

No, it also strengthens it; both in opportunity and the collective culture.

> Anyone who wants to have a posh vaccine passport can get one easily and at no cost

A, you're wrong; there are many people who can't get vaccinated for various reasons; myocarditis, clots, GBS, CFS, etc.; and B, you're missing the point. Poorer people and minorities have many good reasons, historical and current, to distrust governments and pharma companies.

You say posh four times - it's not about being posh when 80+ % of the population has it.

>The columnist doesn't like the income gap, and protests against the least reliable, most easily subverted signifier?

Again, you are wide of the mark by a considerable margin. For people who have decided - for reasons you consider valid or otherwise - that they are not going to take this particular vaccine, a vaccine passport is not actually easy to get.

I heard from a friend at home (I'm an expat) that in the age groups where everyone has been offered a vaccine by now, the acceptance rate is between 95% and 98%.

I'm happy and proud to come from a country where the "many people who can't vaccinated" are so few.

Perhaps it would be more accurate to say hideously divided society might be exposed instead?

It is a fantastic piece of marketing when you can label people who are not buying your product as some kind of "bad person"

I have a question for people who think that people should accept vaccination for the benefit of the community. Typically when such a thing is asked for, community also offers something in return..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6mxqC9SiRh8

What does the community offer these people in return? Neglect and calling fraud?

It doesn’t even make sense because these vaccines don’t actually immunize you or stop any spread. That basically negates any moral argument for getting the vaccine.

Even if everyone gets the shot, the virus will eventually run through everyone, and we’ll be thanking Pfizer for the “comparatively minor” symptoms.

wow if this is the best we got in terms of conversation in this thread.. we've reached peak ignorance

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