Comment by eganist | Hacker News Reader

Comment by eganist | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

> If you follow this reasoning, then you must also beleive that we should stigmatise people with other life choices that fill hospitals? Stigmatising obese people, people who drink alcohol, people who do extreme sports, people who have children late in life. Where does it end?

It's pretty simple: we stigmatize people whose choices place undue burden on others' ability to live safely.

Driving drunk?

Driving 90/55 on a crowded road?

Indiscriminately discharging a firearm into the air?

Exposing people to typhi salmonella after being established as a carrier?

Exposing people to HIV (and other STDs) knowingly?

Choosing to be unvaccinated against covid?

We seem to have a pretty consistent pattern here, and considering that remaining unvaccinated increases spread and increases everyone's risk of death (especially those who can't receive the vaccine), stigmatization of those who choose not to vaccinate without sound medical grounds fits this easy binary filter.

Difficult to categorize as such, because the vaccinated still spread the virus. And as long as R_t>1 pretty much everyone will get it.

So unvaccinated cause harm to others indirectly by burding the healthcare system. And one also does that by socially acceptable stuff like motorcycling (or maybe that's a plus if one is organ donor?).

Indeed. That's why helmets are mandatory for motorcyclists. Helmets are to motorcycles as vaccines are to COVID. Neither guarantees that you don't die or need intensive care, but both reduce the likelihood.

I really like this comparison but it misses the main reason that this is such a huge issue: there are basically no downsides to wearing a helmet, but for some people vaccinations will cause health problems. I know that P(issues from Covid) > P(issues from Covid Vaccines) for almost all cases, but the downside is hard for people to ignore.

https://www.pharmacytimes.com/view/vaccinated-individuals-ca...

> The viral load declined more rapidly for those who were fully vaccinated than those who were unvaccinated. However, investigators noted that vaccinated individuals did not have a lower peak viral load than those who were vaccinated.

Tldr: there's probably a window where vaccinated people can transmit the virus as effectively as unvaccinated people, but that window is almost certainly shorter.

While that's probably not helpful in household settings, it's still plenty useful in cutting disease spread during short terms in confined spaces.

> Exposing people to HIV (and other STDs) knowingly?

But doesn't California's SB 239 mean that a lot of people don't believe this anymore? And don't most people who think SB 239 was a good thing also hate people who don't want the vaccine?

> But didn't California just move in the exact opposite direction on this particular point?

From my reading, Cali HSC 120290 criminalizes knowingly transmitting any STD, which fits the bill for stigmatization. I'm guessing your point is it seems like transmitting any STD is a misdemeanor now, whereas in the past, only HIV would be tagged — with a felony, specifically. Right?

I'd venture that it's an adjustment with the times, specifically that HIV is no longer a death sentence especially as drugs for HIV come upon patent expiration in ~6 years time.

Still a stigma, and it still impairs a person's ability to have a normal romantic life, but it's no longer murder-adjacent.

But shouldn't the punishment for knowingly transmitting a permanent STD be worse than for transmitting ones that can be completely cured with some antibiotics?

I haven't heard something as offensive to my sense of justice as downgrading giving STDs to others from felony to misdemeanor for a very long time.

I mean seriously, is there anyone out there who prefers getting an STD (let alone a very serious one) then getting punched in the face for example or getting your home broken into?

I'm not defending it; just giving context around how it may have come to pass.

Why did you ignore all the counter-examples I gave? Are you saying you stigmatise obese people, and people who drink?

> Why did you ignore all the counter-examples I gave? Are you saying you stigmatise obese people, and people who drink?

Your points were addressed implicitly, but I can do so explicitly at your behest:

Obesity and alcoholism aren't preventing people with other conditions from seeking medical care because the current medical system (at least in western nations) can account for and manage these conditions successfully, unlike COVID which has consistently resulted in resource, capacity, and utility shortages throughout the pandemic thereby posing an undue risk to general welfare and the lives of others.

I also say this as someone who's been both obese and not obese: unlike a decision to refuse a life-saving vaccine, refusing to eat is far, far harder. And as someone who refuses to drink specifically because I know my own tendencies towards addiction, I empathize with those who started drinking socially and suddenly found themselves trapped by the vice grip of an alcohol abuse disorder.

None of these compare to to choosing to refuse a vaccine without sound medical grounds.

There's nothing much to debate here; the topics you flagged are pretty personal topics for me, so I'll gladly and passionately defend against their misuse in debate.

Thankyou for your explanation, I genuinely didn't understand the implicit response.

And I think I agree with you, that the essential difference is how easy it is to get vaccinated.

I probably come to different conclusions because I know people for whom it's not "easy". This is because they are fearful of vaccines, mistrust authority, are uneducated or are paranoid. I think there is a parallel between an alcoholic slowly ruining their life through denial of the effects of drinking, and someone refusing a useful vaccine due to fear. In both cases, stigma may help them change course, but in my experience is is more likely to entrench the behaviour. Thus I don't think it should be used.

The reason hospitals still "can't cope" (this is frequently a relentless exaggeration but let's roll with it) is because the healthcare system has persistently refused to train new people or lift a finger to increase capacity in any way, and in fact, is now firing healthcare workers en-masse for not taking it, even though many don't need to and it doesn't eliminate transmission anyway.

At some point people need to stop being so lenient on health suppliers. They are implicitly demanding society trashes itself to avoid them having to hire and train. It's endemic now, there is no cure, the treatment is mostly still oxygen+drugs. There's no excuse.

I find this sort of lack of future planning occurs in many industries. Where I live there is a high demand for engineers, but few companies are willing to train graduates, they prefer to import workers since without loyalty, training is simply a cost-centre. If the problem gets bad enough, governments respond with University funding, which takes at least 4 years before this flows on to industry.

I encourage everyone eligible to get vaccinated, but obese patients are the majority of the COVID-19 hospital load. In other words, if we had zero obesity rate there would be no concern about overwhelming the hospitals.

https://www.wfae.org/health/2021-09-30/novant-says-9-of-10-c...

Pretty much all experts now admit the virus will be endemic (even if everyone were vaccinated), so you will encounter it eventually. This means that refusing the vaccine is really just hurting yourself.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com