Common COVIDiocy: Is Vaccine Hesitancy Due to Lack of Education? New Studies Sheds Light on Why

According to Edzard Ernst, citing a study by the Austrian Science Ministry, anti-vaxxers are across all age groups, gender, and so on. There is only one consistent characteristic: the vaccination rate is strongly related to the level of education. 

The other interesting thing to point out is that people who were formerly from Romania or Russia are the least likely to vaccinate, and such low rates are not observed among the other immigrant groups. The hesitancy may be attributed somewhat to the lack of trust in the government, despite living in a new jurisdiction. 

Is the problem as simple as simply educating the folks though? Is it as simple as using a slogan: "Those who know nothing must believe everything"?  

(Sounds like a variation on "if you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything" but I digress)

Which reminded me of an antivaxxer I met in real life. My job and my social circle don't tend to intersect with antivaxxers, except for one thing... 

A few years ago (before COVID), I took Lyft to work almost daily, and as a result, I met a lot of drivers with a lot of different views. One day, I met a black antivaxxer as my driver. He was listening to a radio talk show about anti-vaccine views, and they kept bringing up Tuskegee Study. 

(If you didn't know, the doctors back in 1932 chose NOT to treat syphilis in some black men without telling them, just to observe how far the disease can go. This was unethical and later the US government made formal apologies as well as created compensation funds and provided health coverage to the participant survivors, their spouses, and their children. )

So I asked him how much does he believe in this stuff. Turns out he's pretty far in, laced with a dose of black power, Illuminati (of old white men), and so on. I basically just listened, and try not to react because much of it really make no sense to me.  

I have no idea what his education level was, but somehow, reading that education level corresponds strongly with vaccination rate and that fear of government just brought back that little incident. 

I hope you are doing well, bro. And you did eventually got your COVID vax, both doses plus booster. 

Rant: Occupation of buildings as protest?

Image via Wikipedia

A bunch of students have taken over several University of California campus buildings at UC Berkeley and UC Santa Cruz, as well as other campuses. The students are "outraged" by the increase in fees, to over 10000, roughly 32%. So what exact did these student "protest" this lack of funds? By causing massive police presence, occupying buildings, forcing police to break in, trespassing, and destroying rooms and general vandalizing. They were finally evicted by police, charged with various misdemeanors and infractions in some cases.

Their protests actually COST the university system more money.

They claim they are expressing their outrage over the fee increase, but they are actually contributing to the problem by causing general mayhem, thus causing the school to lose even MORE MONEY.

Also, if the classes would be cut due to lack of funds, wouldn't you want to get your money's worth NOW, instead of cutting class and join this "protest" that actually costs the schools MORE money?

So in other words, it's like protesting lack of civil rights by beating up African-American people.

Tell me how is that logical?

What's more, a bunch of yahoos then messed up the UC Chanceller's RESIDENCE building, and vandalized the entire front porch, plus throwing a TORCH at it, essentially trying to firebomb it! That's completely OUTRAGEOUS! These are ****ing terrorists, not student activists!

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