DON'T PANIC.... well, maybe a little bit.

Almost all medical interventions are fraught with risk but these are mostly accepted as on balance the outcomes are seen as being for the greater good. With the rush to introduce a new anti Covid 19 vaccine I am not lining up to be a guinea pig. I don't really accept that my scepticism makes me some kind of extremist ratbag. But then perhaps this post will be followed by angry retorts suggesting I should be put down.
I am certainly very far from being an anti vaxer by any definition. The thing is, the vaccines already in place for all the other diseases have been thoroughly tested and gone through all the proper steps. With Covid, it just doesn't seem to be the case at this time. Today it is all in the race to claim first. Testing is basically being conducted on the general populations. Companies declaring success refuse to publish their details concerning their vaccines.

People are going to be the guinea pig. All these pharma companies who are manufacturing millions of doses before they have the answers are actively selling them to governments. If governments are spending billions, I am guessing they will not want to be throwing them away if found to not being that great.

I am in the high danger zone with this virus but I will not be running out to get it when it first becomes available. I will take the chances and wait until all the Gen Population guinea pigs show if it works or not. Can we even trust the governments to be honest on it? By that time, maybe an actual properly tested vaccine will be available.
 
With the rush to introduce a new anti Covid 19 vaccine I am not lining up to be a guinea pig. I don't really accept that my scepticism makes me some kind of extremist ratbag.

I have never been a vaccine skeptic, but I have also never been faced with taking a vaccine that has been in existence for less than 10 years.
 
Today's news has WHO celebrating almost the eradication of polio from Africa except for this reservation.

"The continent still sees cases of vaccine-derived polio, which is a rare mutated form of the weakened but live virus contained in the oral polio vaccine. This weakened form of the virus can pass among under-immunized populations and eventually changes to a form that can cause paralysis.

That mutated virus can spark crippling polio outbreaks, and 16 African countries are currently experiencing cases: Angola, Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Ivory Coast, Congo, Ethiopia, Guinea, Ghana, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Togo and Zambia." (Full story https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-08...ild-polio-by-certification-committee/12596208 )
"By 1910, frequent epidemics became regular events throughout the developed world primarily in cities during the summer months. At its peak in the 1940s and 1950s, polio would paralyze or kill over half a million people worldwide every year." https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_polio

So, are the mutated forms of polio killing more or less than half a million people a year? Let's have the whole picture, rather than just the negative bits that that suit our needs.

We all want that free lunch, where other people get to be the guinea pigs, but if it is getting tested, it is getting tested on someone. This whole idea that we want to be the last one to take a risk for the greater good, it just seems so emblematic of modern politics. The concept of solidarity seems to have been misplaced by about half the population of many countries. Even people who say they want to put their own nation first, nationalists, refuse to make the smallest personal sacrifices for that nation (wearing masks, for example). It is troubling.

You know how they used to administer the smallpox vaccine? A doctor would poke a needle in a sick person's scab (cowpox), then take that needle and scratch a long (and sometimes deep) wound in the patient who was to been vaccinated. Some doctors offered additional preparations to ensure that the vaccine was effective, preparations like fasting for several days before the vaccine or inducing vomiting.
In spite of this, the rich would travel far and pay well for these harshly administered vaccines. It was a matter of simple math, their children's odds of dying from the vaccine were less than the odds of dying (or suffering permanent injury) from smallpox. It's just simple math.
 
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I am certainly very far from being an anti vaxer by any definition. The thing is, the vaccines already in place for all the other diseases have been thoroughly tested and gone through all the proper steps. With Covid, it just doesn't seem to be the case at this time. Today it is all in the race to claim first. Testing is basically being conducted on the general populations. Companies declaring success refuse to publish their details concerning their vaccines.

People are going to be the guinea pig. All these pharma companies who are manufacturing millions of doses before they have the answers are actively selling them to governments. If governments are spending billions, I am guessing they will not want to be throwing them away if found to not being that great.

I am in the high danger zone with this virus but I will not be running out to get it when it first becomes available. I will take the chances and wait until all the Gen Population guinea pigs show if it works or not. Can we even trust the governments to be honest on it? By that time, maybe an actual properly tested vaccine will be available.
I really understand how people are concerned about this. However, the governments are making a bet on which vaccines will be successful and the unsuccessful ones will just have to be destroyed (if they dont buy them now the range of available vaccines will be a lot lower so its in our interests that rich governments go ahead with this gamble). All the data will be available from the clinical studies for you to make an informed choice yourself when the time comes when the vaccines are finished phase 3 trials. Ask your doctor which vaccine they are providing and research it.
I will certainly not be taking the Sputnik vaccine that the Russians are launching early but depending on how the testing is done for the other vaccines I will make an informed decision for myself. Yes they are developing them a lot faster than usual - but they are also performing much larger phase 3 trials than a normal vaccine development would have (this isnt the case in the Russian example).
Vaccines have been one of the most imporant developments in human health history and I really distresses me how anti-vaxxers are so willing to forget this. I'm relieved to live in a world where small pox is eradicated, where polio is almost eridacted and where children dont regularly die/ have horrible health outcomes from measles etc.
 

This seems like a crazy idea and will put people off testing. I would hate to be asymptomatic and forced into a quarantine center. I imagine it would just increase the chances of getting sicker.
 

This seems like a crazy idea and will put people off testing. I would hate to be asymptomatic and forced into a quarantine center. I imagine it would just increase the chances of getting sicker.
People are already avoiding testing - we had a bit of an issue in work last week with too many people in our waiting room. We couldnt get them to leave until one of our more blunt managers threatened that the authorities could come and do rapid tests on them, never saw a room clear out so fast in my life.
 
That is scary indeed. Completely unenforceable as usual (will they send out unmarked vans to pick people up off the street?). Also would people have to pay for their quarantine stay?
 
I get why they are going to do that. Just look at what happened when they opened up Car Free Day and when they reopened the airports. People aren't being disciplined.

However you will have people escape or at least try to like at the beginning of this because they will be afraid of losing their income/job and to avoid the social shame from their community. Does that mean they are going to have armed guards making sure everyone stays in quarantine at these locations?


In Singapore, it is about $8-9k for two weeks quarantine which is one reason a friend of mine said he won't be visiting Indonesia anytime soon. I heard Cambodia requires each person to have $3k in case they need to go into quarantine. Things might have changed for Cambodia, but that is what one of the teachers group on Facebook had said. Malaysia has just recently required quarantine at government buildings, maybe about 2-3 weeks ago. Before you could self quarantine at home like another friend of mine did.
 
I think Jakarta is trying to send a message to the Central Government that if they keep refusing any attempt to control the virus and only concentrate on the economy, we will get drastic in our restrictions. Came out today about the spread on air planes. The Islamic boarding schools are a den of virus spread. Any place that there is any gathering seems to spread it easily.

Let's face it. The central government wants to say that all is under control when the numbers keep a steady rise daily. They say it will peak soon and all will be well. They fail to look at the rest of the world and get some clues to reality. That or they are intentionally misleading the public and that is starting to be claimed by scientist here that are starting to call out the government on putting economy before public health. Sometimes I think the central government is just waiting for heard immunity while being too stupid to look at what long terms effects that could bring.

Let's face it. The only way one can try and stay safe until a proven vaccine is available is to look after themselves. One certainly can not depend on government for reliable information or acts to protect people. This is definitely an One Man\Woman for Her\Himself moment in history.
 
The Government is not your friend it seems.



Anything that is worse than the US is really bad. I mean, really bad.
 
That is scary indeed. Completely unenforceable as usual (will they send out unmarked vans to pick people up off the street?). Also would people have to pay for their quarantine stay?
Yesterday, I saw a Tik-Tok video showing an entire family being picked up from their house and moved to a quarantine hospital against their will - the health officials arrived at 3am. After 4 weeks, they are just now being allowed to return home. People are going to go to extremes to avoid being tested.
Edit to add: the kicker was: according to the video, they had been self-isolating at home and were all asymptomatic.
 
Yesterday, I saw a Tik-Tok video showing an entire family being picked up from their house and moved to a quarantine hospital against their will - the health officials arrived at 3am. After 4 weeks, they are just now being allowed to return home. People are going to go to extremes to avoid being tested.
Edit to add: the kicker was: according to the video, they had been self-isolating at home and were all asymptomatic.

That seems incredibly efficient for Indonesia...
 
So I had the first Covid death of someone I actually know. A former longtime employee (that is, he used to work for me for a long time ago, but hasn't for the past few years) of mine died of Covid about a week ago, I just learned about it. He was taken to hospital, and that was the last time his family could see him. His family was also tested and his wife and son+wife all have it, although mild so they are isolating at home. That is it as far as contact tracing goes in Bali. The son said no one bothered to ask who his contacts were etc. So yeah...
 
So I had the first Covid death of someone I actually know. A former longtime employee (that is, he used to work for me for a long time ago, but hasn't for the past few years) of mine died of Covid about a week ago, I just learned about it. He was taken to hospital, and that was the last time his family could see him. His family was also tested and his wife and son+wife all have it, although mild so they are isolating at home. That is it as far as contact tracing goes in Bali. The son said no one bothered to ask who his contacts were etc. So yeah...
How old was he ?
 

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