Tuesday, September 14, 2021

More COVIDiocy: Why Are People, esp. Medical Professionals, Refusing Vaccines?

Evidence is incontrovertible: new COVID cases are almost exclusively of unvaccinated people. People who are not fully vaccinated are at MUCH HIGHER risk of dying. 32x more likely, according to CDC statistics

Yes, some vaccinated people have "Breakthru COVID", but the symptoms are vastly reduced and rarely require a hospital stay. And yes, the vaccines work the same on the Delta variant, just a bit less effective. Data in New York suggests vaccine effectiveness against hospitalization was 92% before Delta, and 80% now that Delta is the predominant strain. 

So there's no reason other than entitledness and pettiness (aka "You can't tell me what to do!" "I have rights!") to refuse vaccination. 

Indeed, that's why the alt-right is pushing random drugs that they claim can treat COVID, or want to focus on the breakthru cases and use that to discredit the vaccine, or believe outlandish lies like "there are microchips in the vaccines"... because they refuse to accept the obvious: it is up to the individuals to get vaccinated, in order protect the public at large. 

When did Americans get this SELFISH? 

As the Delta variants get more prevalent, and more people refuse to be vaccinated, the medical system is getting overloaded. At least one state had already instituted "care rationing" due to full ICUs, and several stories have already circulated about how ICUs, already full of COVID patients, are forced to turn away treatable patients for heart attacks, pancreatitis, and so on, resulting in death. 

You'd think that the medical professionals, who were on the forefront of COVID fight, would be the most eager to get the vaccines, but that is not necessarily the case. Some are total holdouts who would rather be fired, than get vaccinated themselves. In June 2021, WebMD / Medscape study shows that "1 in 4 hospital workers with direct contact with patients had not received a single dose of COVID shot as of end of May"

The odds can be even worse: 1 in 3 workers in the largest hospitals in the US are unvaxxed, according to the same report. Some hospitals in Florida have vax rate of 30-40 percent. 

The news is so alarming that some hospital systems, such as Houston Methodist Hospital, instituted their own vaccine mandate, and has a vaccination rate of 99+%.  And in case you were wondering "is that legal", the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission EEOC has greenlit vaccine mandate in May 2021 provided that accommodations are made to people who are exempt. Many cities are already doing so, such as San Francisco, that some have taken to protests

Yet if you hear from these protesters, their main beef can be boiled down to "you can't tell me what to do!" Albeit in different forms. One nurse claimed she has a right to choose whether to work with or without the vaccination, another claimed he has a right to choose if he wanted to share his vaccination status with his employer. Both can be summed up as "you can't tell me what to do!"   

In fact, many clinics across the nation are facing labor shortages... Because their staff refused to be vaccinated. Anecdotes from various states indicate that small clinic's staff are quitting when the head of clinic asked employees to be vaccinated to protect the patients. They rather sit at home for their "freedom" than accept responsibility to protect the public at large. Economy? Public health? Who cares about that? You can't tell me what to do! 

The screams are even louder from the Republicans about "Tyrant Biden" and how the new "Federal vaccine mandate" is an "assault on freedom". 

It's not a vaccine mandate. It's a TEST mandate that you get tested WEEKLY, that you can opt-out by getting vaccinated. 

But then again, it comes back down to "You can't tell me what to do!"

We're being told to do all sorts of things by the government all the time. We need to wear seatbelts. We need to have a driver's license. We need to pay taxes. We need to wear helmets when riding bicycles and motorcycles and e-scooters... 

COVID has already taken 659K people from US. Every refusal to vaccinate is a delay to control COVID, which leads to increasing hospitalization and death. 

Is "You can't tell me what to do" more important than not being a COVIDiot? 

COVID wouldn't care what you believe, whether you are "free" or not. 


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