The problem with that is that, once you get your rights “temporarily suspended”, you won’t get them back.
We absolutely agree on the part that’s most important, taking an active interest in critical thinking while navigating a very complex changing series of events. As long as everyone keeps investigating and pays attention, beneficial courses of action can be determined.
Maybe I’m not arguing so much as lamenting that the process of research and peer review is necessary to find the answer and it also is not keeping pace with the rate at which a solution needs to be produced. Why could the Israel study not be peer reviewed by now? It tremendously informs next steps if well produced. If find it unfortunate that a peer reviewed paper also contains statements that technically have a valid footnote from the past, but are currently mathematically irrational.
I agree we that we don’t technically know if the vaccine has applied selection pressure because all the variants we see in abundance existed prior to vaccine deployment. It will continue to be extremely difficult to prove if the vaccine evasions were random or pressured.
What I don’t appreciate in this article, peer reviewed or not, is the blaming and shaming of the unvaccinated as solely responsible for circulation when clearly we have significant quantities of breakthrough cases. A solution to this is going to require addressing the facts and ignoring some of the facts won’t result in success. 100% vaccination won’t control this. We need to be smarter than that. I think language in papers like this is distracting to problem solving and puts too much weight on a red herring.
And yes, I think we both agree and we are both trying ride the swirl and figure out which direction it’s turning. If we seem to disagree I’m pretty sure it’s only because we are momentarily facing different directions. And I think that really in many ways describes others as well. People are doing the best they can with this information from the angle they see it. Biased peer reviewed papers aren’t helping. Lunatic claims with no basis aren’t helping. Removal of information by people who think they know better when they don’t isn’t helping. Over-reactionary fear to groups who would take advantage and need to be held in check isn’t helping.
Anyway, I appreciate all critical thinkers. That element is what keeps the whole system balanced.
But being asked to wear a mask, for example on private property, isnt a question of rights, and it shouldn’t be. Nobody’s rights are being suspended.
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I agree that we have to be super careful about opening doors to policies that appear useful, even necessary, in one situation and can be used and abused for all kinds of other things later. I’m assuming though, that these are often introduced in a more subtle way and are harder to understand. So for example, while many people are up in arms about wearing masks or not, data protection laws might be loosened and only a few care.
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This has been a remarkably civil discussion. Is this the internet? It doesn’t seem like it could be… no personal attacks, no flaming, no trolling. It’s refreshing. Thank you Bass Buzzers!
Living up to our reputation! Just substitute “think critically” with “perform”.
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@RuknRole and @Ed: I’m not talking about the suspension of rights; I’m talking about voluntarily choosing, as an individual, not to exercise a right.
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When it comes to masks I don’t see the case you’re making. They can mandate I wear shirt, pants, and shoes in public places. They mandate seatbelts and helmets on bikes, motorcycles, and other forms of transportation.
I don’t see masks as losing another right. I could be wrong, but I haven’t seen a case made for it.
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An interlude to the discussion with a little mask guideline humor…
To play devils advocate: It is kind of ironic that there have been ongoing attempts and laws actually being introduced to ban face covering veils worn by muslim women in Europe (France, I think). One reason being: It is impossible to communicate if you don’t see the face.
In Germany we have a ban on covering your face when attending a demonstration. So actually, masks gave us back some rights. 
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I love that question! I think looking at cases like this probably hold key answers to what’s going on.
Germany was very good at doing this and yet wasn’t able to control spread as well as these countries. I doubt the answer lies solely with masking, distancing, tracking and tracing. We have other comparisons that were strict in their behavior and failed. Asking “what is different here” would be a fascinating exploration.
One of my favorite things to do on this topic is to run graphs from the Oxford World in Data website. It’s possible to compare things like death rates for places with different policy. It’s interesting to run the curves for Sweden and Australia and compare them, for example. According to the Oxford site the case rate for the current wave in Australia is 4x the case rate from the last curve, yet the death rate is 1/4th the rate from the last curve. And there’s the key question again. What’s different? Does the vaccination rate account for the lowered death rate? More to explore.
Overall, I’m surprised we don’t have more useful insight from all the data that’s out there. Haven’t we had aircraft carriers with outbreaks? Prisons? We should certainly know what percent of a population subset (not a true random sample) gets infected when everyone is simultaneously exposed. Where are those numbers?
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You can look at Sturges, where they had a bike rally and statewide infections were up 450 times in the weeks following.
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I guess I live in a rebel state.
Under Florida law, a bicycle rider or passenger must wear a helmet only if they are under 16 years of age.
Motorcyclists and motorcycle passengers who are 21 years old or older may be exempt from Florida’s motorcycle helmet requirement only if they obtain insurance coverage that provides a minimum of $10,000 in no-fault personal medical benefits for a motorcycle crash.
Have you looked at music festivals and football games across the country lately? We the Harley crowd always get a bad rap. Ironically those who ride a Harley are mostly professional and highly educated.
There are so many factors at play that may or may not interact with each other, add up. Listened to an interview with some data modeling people once. Fascinating stuff.
One of the main differences was probably the point in time at which severe measures were taken to contain the virus. Countries with more experience in pandemics (remember SARS?) were already trained in certain responses. People didn’t have to be convinced, they knew the protocol. Again, not the only reason, just one of many.
It’s just a well defined set of data. No comments on Harleys made.
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We’re seeing that same set of data in lots of places. Preliminarily we’re chalking it up to two main factors: 1. Case rates include a. vaccinated breakthrough cases b. naturally acquired immunity breakthrough cases, and c. unvaccinated cases - and breakthrough cases are way, way less likely to be hospitalized or die - so we should see that shift overall mortality down substantially - this is probably the biggest statistical factor. 2. We’re better at treating COVID overall - hospitals and doctors were dealing with a super-unknown 18 months ago during the first surges. Just since August 2020, just in the US, we’ve treated 2,899,368 hospitalized cases of COVID - the sheer terrible scale of that amount of practice is making us a little better at treating- and that shifts mortality down a bit.
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Is it also that age plays a role? Vaccination rate of older people being higher therefore less deaths?
Sturgis Motorcycle Rally 2021
Lollapalooza 2021 in Chicago
Both held early days of August. And Sturgis gets all the bad press.
** For the record you would not find me at any of them.
Sturgis happened in a rural state with no large metropolitan areas or competing events. It’s a cleaner set of data. As compared to Chicago.
Nothing to do with bikes mate
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