[JamisonM]

This is so hopelessly stupid I just feel sorry for you at this point.

If you think that the hospitals just magically emptied out and the virus is still circulating at the same rate as before vaccinations started in every jurisdiction that has significant vaccination rates you are hopelessly lost.

But I know you are not hopelessly lost, you are just not engaged in an honest discussion.

[ppf]

My turn to accuse you of dishonesty - intellectual, this time. All the vaccine developers have promised about the vaccines is that they will reduce symptoms, as I'm sure you are fully aware. Unless some later study is done that provides some more concrete data on exactly how the vaccine is achieving what it is, at the moment all we can say is that the benefits we see (reduced hospitalisations and deaths, as well as some amount of reduced transmission) are a secondary effect of that primary benefit.

In case you missed it - I am not denying that the vaccines have done good - I am just very carefully sticking to what the vaccine developers themselves have said about the vaccine, which does not include anything about reducing transmission.

[JamisonM]

https://www.gavi.org/vaccineswork/mounting-evidence-suggests...

Go ahead and wait for "absolute proof" or some other absurd standard to believe something about a novel virus to make up your mind, whatever. You concede in your comment "as well as some amount of reduced transmission", give it up already!

All along following the most obvious path that evidence has lead towards proven to be fruitful, here is another case.. in case you have missed it.

[ppf]

I concede nothing. From my original comment, "Also, I have yet to see any concrete data on how much the various vaccines reduce transmission.".

It would be nice if it does, and it is plausible that the vaccines do reduce transmission to some extent, but their primary route of action is to save lives by reducing symptoms.

Apparently demanding something better than the level of "evidence suggests" from your linked article (and even that is new news, which means we had no evidence at all until recently) makes me an idiot and worthy of derision. You are not helping the stereotype.

FWIW - how long do you call a coronavirs "novel", given it's fairly rapid mutation rate? At this point, Covid-19 is practically ancient.

And so far - your "obvious path", at least as it was implemented in the country I live in, is quite likely to cause economic and social ruin.

[JamisonM]

There has been evidence of reduced transmission for months, again you are not engaging in an honest evaluation of the evidence.

Most governments actually haven't followed the most obvious path in much of anything to do with this virus, that has been the source of most of the ruin.

Go get vaccinated.

[ppf]

You are apparently unable to recognise an honest evaulation when you see one. I've read the article you linked, and others. They all make statements like "evidence suggests", which is barely the first rung on the ladder of being able to make any conclusion from the study of a particular phenomenon.

If I had enthusiastically queued up to get vaccinated as soon as I was able where I live, I would have received a treatment (AstraZenica vaccine) that has since been withdrawn from my age group. Tell me how my caution has not been justified.

Just for fun - what governments have followed the "most obvious path"? There aren't many left, of the supposed golden list everyone liked to promote last year. Vietnam - apparently a fine example of what happens when we "all just wear a mask" - after months with deaths oddly flatlined at 35, they are now experiencing a dramatic rise in cases over the past few weeks. South Korea - has now been experiencing increases in deaths and cases over the last few months. The stats for Australia look good, but they continue to live under draconian measures, and have gained a reputation for allowing the rich and famous (including sports players) to publicly flout the rules. It's a similar story in New Zealand, and those last two countries also enjoy unique geographical and demographic situations not shared by many others (remote, sparsely-populated island nations).

[JamisonM]

I enthusiastically queued up to get AZ as soon as it was offered and now I will happily be getting a Moderna 2nd shot in a few days. Your caution has not been justified, the over-caution of the governments on these matters on the other has also not been justified. That's another thing that is pretty clear from publicly available information.

I made the absolutely correct assessment that the balance of probabilities was strongly in favour of the idea that mixing vaccines would be at least as effective as getting the same shot twice. A really good example of taking a most obvious path.

There are lots of jurisdictions that have done a very good job doing just very obvious things that work. Pretending that recent challenges or flare-ups negates the enormous areas under the death and hospitalisation curves to this point for these places is another example of obvious dishonesty in your arguments. This is like when Trump said "South Korea I hear isn't doing that well anymore" when the epidemic was raging in the US and SK was trying to get a daily case count in the hundreds under control.

As well citing the powerful flouting the rules as some excuse to not have rules is doubly dishonest and silly.

Australia's "draconian" rules look pretty good to me, under the draconian rules I am living under I can't go to a comedy club - I could in Melbourne. And if my neighbour lived in Melbourne I presume that the gall bladder surgery that he's had delayed 3 times because the hospitals are full would be done already. I live in place that effectively cancelled Mother's Day on the Friday in a bout of such stupid incompetence that seemed almost perfectly designed to bankrupt restaurants after weeks of warnings from the doctors and the media that the hospitals are literally filling up. The correct path in that instance was obvious, the government refused to take it and now I am in fact still living under draconian rules that could have been relaxed weeks ago if timely action had been taken.

If you want an example of a jurisdiction that has hardly any advantages and many, many disadvantages I would point you towards Atlantic Canada - a highly import dependent economy that is very integrated with the US and the rest of Canada, strained healthcare system at the best of times, and a very old population. Look at their results, moderate travel restrictions, reasonable enforcement, high levels of public engagement. It wasn't even very hard for them to do it, they just had to make the choice and did so.