[wdhilliard]

My problem is that the whole thing is based on old data and a false premise that life is safe when vaccinated people are only around vaccinated people. We know this is slightly more true than among the unvaccinated, but only by about 40%. This is real data.

Fears of privacy implications: Tracking data/metadata, How data is recorded, How long are records kept. What other data is linked to vaccination checks?

Fears of discrimination: How is vaccination proven? Are special IDs required? What is the cost of identification? What about people who are ineligible to get vaccinated due to age, health status, medical conditions. What percentage of minority groups are vaccinated in comparison to other groups?

Unintended consequences: Will this make unsafe behavior appear safer to vaccinated individuals? What about future variants? Are there future plans to extend the list of businesses/places this applies to like public transport, medical facilities, etc?

Lastly, If you are vaccinated and feel safe doing these activities, why should you care about those who chose not to get vaccinated

[bern4444]

Vaccination in NY/NYC is easily proven. Picture of your vaccine card is sufficent and there's also the excelsior pass which is a QR code. Super easy to get from a city/state website after entering a few details (think name, when your last vaccine was, which vaccine etc).

This can be downloaded as an image, into apple wallet etc. For those who chose not to, they can stick to carrying around their vaccine card (just as anyone carries around an ID, cash, credit card, cell phone, mask, etc) or just keep a picture of it on their phone

The vaccine is free for everyone, so there's very little discrimination there. In NY there are plenty of sites to go to where you can walk in and be out today in under an hour. Likely half an hour.

As to the privacy, yes, that's a fair concern but its literally no different than having to get a vaccine to travel to certain countries. Data exposed is minimal and not that much more than what would be gathered showing your ID when buying alcohol which contains your name, dob, address, etc. Far more personal information then if I'm vaxxed.

Those who are ineligible for the vaccine (due to age mostly now) I don't think are subject to this. Most people with medical conditions are still able to get vaxxed. If not, they especially should not be going out. Those who are vaxxed and also immunocompromised have far less protection as well compared to their peers who aren't immunocompromised.

Anyone over the minimum age qualifies for the vaccine.

If people at this point are willfully choosing not to get vaccinated tough luck. Its absurd and they shouldn't be allowed to prevent those of us who care about each other and the community from enjoying life again.

[kian]

In response to 'but its literally no different than having to get a vaccine to travel to certain countries', we literally (as in have a literal - written word - constitution) that explicitly prohibits the prevention of movement between the states in the same way that we do between countries.

There is a quite literal, and federally-mandated, difference.

You literally aren't even allowed to ask for someone's ID to cross internal US borders - but you think medical records, which contain just as much (if not more) personally-identifying information would be okay?

"Show me your papers, please."

[bern4444]

No one is suggesting preventing non New Yorkers from coming into New York. We only ask they respect our laws. People are always welcome to visit unhindered.

If they want the full NY experience which includes eating at a restaurant they must follow the laws in NY. One of these is paying the NY sales tax, not the sales tax of the state from which they're visiting. They also must comply with NY's vaccine requirements to eat at a restaurant.

If they don't want to, they're welcome to come and enjoy all the other activities that don't require proof of vaccination.

[tootie]

Think of it more like a drivers license. Proof that you have passed a written test, driving test and an eye exam. Includes your full name, home address, photo and DOB. The Excelsior Pass has less info than that. And will only be required for entering private property from which people can already be barred entry for arbitrary reasons.

[kian]

Again - you cannot require a driver's license to cross state lines. Precisely because you cannot be required to present that information in order to move about freely. As long as you aren't the person driving ;)

I understand that this is not inter-state travel, but at the same time you cannot be required to provide your identification by law enforcement or others without cause within them. It is not illegal to walk about without documentation as to who you are.

You aren't even required to show identification to walk into a tobacco or liquor store - only to purchase.

Certain government buildings, bars, clubs, and smoking lounges are the only exceptions I know of to this rule. There is no compelling reason to expand that list, nor the information they are allowed to request.

[bern4444]

You won't need to show a vaccine card to cross state lines, only to go out to eat.

Of course its okay to walk around without an ID, no one suggests otherwise. But if you go to a restaurant without an ID, and get carded you can't order your drink.

Is the restaurant obligated to serve you then? Absolutely not.

You can enter the state without a vaccine card, you just won't be able to enjoy eating out in all the incredible restaurants in the state.

[dragonwriter]

> Again - you cannot require a driver's license to cross state lines.

You can require a driver's license to drive on specified roads in the state, and you can apply that rule to out-of-state residents.

Similarly, you can require proof of vaccination at certain public venues, and apply thar rule to out-of-state residents.

[dragonwriter]

No one is suggesting requiring medical records at internal US borders (which, incidentally, the Constitution does not prohibit, though it doesn't allow states to unilaterally adopt such controls), so your entire argument

[damontal]

>Vaccination in NY/NYC is easily proven. Picture of your vaccine card is sufficent

That’s easily faked. To prove vaccination, a picture of a card is not sufficient. If that’s all that’s required as proof then this won’t accomplish anything meaningful.

[swader999]

That's exactly the problem. This will be linked to a central authority that then will be able to record all you travel and activity. Able to turn it off and geo-fence you. Social Credit system for the west.

[bern4444]

Perhaps, but so far this isn't a problem. Let's stay focused on the actual problems that we're facing. Maybe some businesses as you suggest will refuse a picture and only accept the physical card. So far this may be up to businesses to decide for themselves.

This is otherwise whataboutism about an issue that isn't an issue.

FWIW, the excelsior pass may be far harder to fake and end up being a solution to this currently non-problem

[analyte123]

Getting a vaccine to cross an international border is not the same as getting a vaccine to walk to a bar on your own street in your own country. Besides, people who have not had the Covid vaccine are not directly preventing anyone from enjoying life. The people are either choosing to not enjoy life themselves, or their government is putting restrictions on them (and then they are obeying them) while blaming the restrictions on non-vaccinated people.

[bern4444]

> Getting a vaccine to cross an international border is not the same as getting a vaccine to walk to a bar on your own street in your own country.

In NY it's trivial to get this vaccine. Getting it is certainly easier than getting any other government id (state id, permit, driver's license etc). Certainly ID is needed to purchase alcohol, drive a car, etc. Maybe not at a bar, but often for purchasing alcohol from a liquor or wine store.

> Besides, people who have not had the Covid vaccine are not directly preventing anyone from enjoying life.

Of course they are. They're taking up space in hospitals, endangering public health, and causing unnecessary harm by spreading covid and increasing the risk of a new variant.

[analyte123]

As long as one is viewing humans solely as harmful disease vectors, obese people also take up substantial space in hospitals and cause further obesity through social contagion. However, we don't mandate that restaurants prohibit serving sugary drinks to those with BMI over 30. People with various STIs also do everything in your list, but that is addressed through awareness of safer practices, in some cases voluntary vaccination and PrEP, and research into better treatments, not through banning extramarital sex or shutting down locations where people meet for sexual activity. People who participate in injury-prone sports and activities also take up disproportionate hospital space, but the US passed the ACA in part to require medical coverage for people regardless of their lifestyle.

The reasoning for restricting behavior based on people's Covid risk (including vaccination status) is exactly the same as in the scenarios above.

People vaccinated against Covid can choose today to live a normal life, confident in the vaccine's protection against their serious illness or hospitalization, without scapegoating those not vaccinated for the entirely predictable seasonal and variant spread of Covid, or forcing struggling small businesses to hire bouncers to check the medical papers of every customer.

[Daishiman]

Anywhere where an ICU bed is taken by an unvaxxed COVID patient is a bed that was available for anyone else for any other reason.

Anwhere where unvaxxed people have to take time out because they're sick is time they could have spent working, contributing towards their families or communities, and someone is going to have to take up the work.

So not, at a collective level, unvaccinated people are _very much_ preventing others from enjoying themselves.

[goostavos]

Is that actually a compelling argument? How is an individual's choice which led to them occupying an ICU as a COVID patient worse than any other of their (presumably very dumb) individual choices?

If we get to pick what we get to shame ICU bed occupancy for, I've got a LOT of other ideas that people probably won't like.

By definition, society is made of up lots of interactions which prevent others from enjoying themselves. I struggle to understand why the line gets drawn at COVID.

[Clubber]

>Anywhere where an ICU bed is taken by an unvaxxed COVID patient is a bed that was available for anyone else for any other reason.

They typically don't put COVID patients in the same vicinity as other patients for obvious reasons. There's usually a dedicated COVID wing.

[h_anna_h]

Don't put unvaxxed and these who were injured/became ill due to their own incompetence or recklessness in an ICU bed then? (as long as they are full that is)

> and someone is going to have to take up the work.

There is a lot of unemployment. This is also true for the paid and unpaid leaves btw, should we illegalise these?

[Daishiman]

> There is a lot of unemployment. This is also true for the paid and unpaid leaves btw, should we illegalise these?

If you are consistently taking leave because you puke your guts out every week from eating spoiled food, that wouldn't be much of an excuse for paid leave.

I find the same is true for those who choose not to vaccinate. I do not find that to be a reasonable risk profile to accommodate in a consequence-free manner.

[AndrewBissell]

Just gonna repost something I saw on Twitter that summarizes this perfectly:

government: take these shots or you'll never get your lives back

person who keeps up with the news: how DARE the people who won't take their shots hold us hostage like this!

https://twitter.com/gnocchiwizard/status/1419721365276475394

[bern4444]

Classic slippery slope fallacy. Just cause we allow something now doesn't mean we allow it always or are in favor of the general principle.

Put up at least a half honest response to contribute to the discussion

[Alex3917]

> Super easy to get from a city/state website after entering a few details (think name, when your last vaccine was, which vaccine etc).

Only available to those who got vaccinated in New York. And given that the NYC border is all of a couple hundred yards from New Jersey and 10 miles from Connecticut, there are tons of people who either live in the city and got vaccinated elsewhere, or else who live elsewhere but are in the city on a daily basis.

[bern4444]

This is about a restriction NY is imposing on New Yorkers. The city and state I'm sure would welcome cooperation with other nearby states in developing a tri state area valid digital vaccine card.

But this isn't about other cities and states so this isn't relevant. States, just like countries, are allowed to impose their own laws so long as they don't encroach on rights and laws from the federal government.

Comity is a legal standard that neighboring states can choose to embrace.

[Alex3917]

> This is about a restriction NY is imposing on New Yorkers.

So you're saying that since I live in Connecticut, I'm allowed to eat indoors in NYC without showing proof of vaccination? I realize that this is literally what the article says, but surely that must be a mistake, no?

[bern4444]

No, if you want to come to NY and eat at a NY restaurant you're subject to NY laws just like you are when you pay the NY sales tax rate. You don't pay the CT sales tax at a NY restaurant.

Vaccine card or leave.

If CT wants to work with NY to create a comity law understanding or a common vaccine card (IE accept CT digital vaccine cards) the states can work together.

[jbeam]

You must show proof of vaccination, but proof of vaccination is not required to be presented via the Excelsior Pass. It would be nice if we had tri-state cooperation there though.

[alecst]

Great reply, thank you. I don't want to get into a long argument, but a lot of what you say hinges on that 40% number. I'd like to know what that refers to. My reply to that 40% number:

I thought that vaccines made you something like 20x less likely to end up in the hospital from coronavirus (widely cited as 95% protective.) And that unvaccinated people spread at 5x the rate of the vaccinated ones. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02054-z

Despite having done some research in virology for my MSc I definitely don't claim to be an expert. The field is really complex, and I'm always open to learning. So feel free to reply and educate me as long as we can keep it cordial.

To answer your last question (presumably non-rhetorical) I worry about unvaccinated people allowing for mutations via community spread, as well as getting sick when they didn't have to, hurting themselves while taking up healthcare resources in the process. Is that unreasonable?

[tzs]

There was some CDC data published recently on breakthrough infections in the US (I don't have a better site--saw it somewhere on Apple New+). It worked out to 4 COVID hospitalizations or deaths per 100k.

For comparison, that's about twice the US death rate due to flu in 2019, and about 1/40th the US death rate due to COVID before vaccinations were available (and before the delta variant was in the US). That's about 10x better than death rate pre-vaccination in the state that had the lowest death rate (Hawaii).

[kadoban]

Aren't you comparing Delta numbers for vaccine and pre-Delta numbers for no-vaccine then? So really you'd expect the difference to be even greater than that.

[keneda7]

Not the original poster but

The article you link says the delta is unknown. Delta is rapidly becoming the most common variant in the US. (https://www.webmd.com/lung/news/20210720/delta-variant-now-a...)

I believe the 40% is coming from the data out of Israel. (https://www.cnbc.com/2021/07/23/delta-variant-pfizer-covid-v...)

Also data from the CDC on the latest outbreak they studies shows that 74% of the positives were vaccinated. At the time the vaccination rate was about 69% for the state. I can't find anything on the actual town. (https://arstechnica.com/science/2021/07/this-900-person-delt...)

The CDC also has said vaccinated do in fact have high viral loads of the virus and can spread it (https://www.npr.org/sections/coronavirus-live-updates/2021/0...)

Do you happen to have any actual studies showing unvaccinated people are causing mutations? I have seen it repeated but never seen the study behind it. I do know leaky vaccines cause outbreaks to spread faster. This can be seen in the past. (https://www.pbs.org/newshour/science/tthis-chicken-vaccine-m...)

As for your last part. Lets look at it another way. Heart disease is the leading killer in the US. One of the best way to prevent heart disease is being physically fit and active. By your logic we should be mandating exercise for everyone to prevent it right? Shouldn't we also be forcing people to quite drinking and smoking as well?

Overall its just a slippery slop when you give the government this right. What happens if conservatives get in power and decided abortion should be banned outright as they consider a fetus a person? By the same logic you are using, they would be perfectly reasonable to do that.

[thinkharderdev]

Whether it is proper for the government to mandate vaccines in certain situation is a complicated question but I think some of your priors are incorrect.

1. The data out of Israel on vaccine efficacy with Delta is out of line with other studies on the matter and is generally considered to suffer from some methodological flaws. See https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2108891 for a study out of Britain showing an efficacy of 88% against symptomatic infection. There is much more data that corroborates only slightly reduced efficacy and the Israel study is the outlier so anchoring to that number is probably a mistake.

2. The Pronvicetown study (where 74% of infected were vaccinated) doesn't tell you anything about vaccine efficacy. The vaccine rate for the town or state are irrelevant since the event in question included a large number of tourists. The town itself only has ~3000 people but there were 60k people there from all over the country at the week-long event.

3. Here is a study showing higher mutational variance in unvaccinated patients: https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.01.21259833v.... This is exactly what we should expect. Vaccines drastically reduce the rate of transmission so we should have a strong prior that they would also reduce the rate of mutation.

[keneda7]

1. The Israel study was the only one I have seen so far. Thank you for linking to the other one. It seem these two studies pretty much contradict each other. Do you happen to have links or can point me in the direction of the other data you referenced? Edit: I did some more research on the UK study. It appears to be outdated and does not use the June and July stats when Delta actually took off. If you use the last two (18 and 19) UK governments technically briefings (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/investigation-of-...) you can calculate the efficiency rating. From my understanding you do this by calculating the infection rates in the vaccinated and unvaccinated, then divide the infection rate in the vaccinated vs the infection rate by the unvaccinated. You then subtract this answer from 1 to get the efficiency. It varies with the age groups but for 50+ I got an effectiveness of about 17%. I could wrong in how I am going about this though. Please let me know if I am

2. I have to disagree here. The CDC report is dealing with Massachusetts residents infected (https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7031e2.htm?s_cid=mm...). It did not include out of state infections. So I would say comparing the state vaccination rate to how many vaccinated state residents got covid is a valid comparison. In fact from what I have seen this study is being used to justify the CDC recommending masks for all again.

3. Thank you very much for this link. I keep seeing a study referenced but was not able to find it. However it has not been peer reviewed yet so we don't really know if its accurate. Any chance you have a study pre-COVID that show this?

[maxk42]

Your excellent reply makes an outstanding argument for not legislating vaccination: The science is far from settled.

Until we have answers that are absolutely certain and the long-term risks are known, we are merely experimenting on the whole of the populace, which could lead to disastrous long-term outcomes.

Policy should be based on facts, not guesses.

[thinkharderdev]

As I said, actually legislating vaccination is a complicated question and it depends on the details of the legislation in question on whether I would personally support it.

However, I think your other points are incorrect. Policy making is always about making decisions under uncertainty so we have to make the best decisions we can given the data we have. And the data we have I believe is overwhelmingly clear that any risks associated with vaccination are dramatically smaller than the risks of COVID itself. To date I am unaware of any substantiated risks of vaccination which aren't also risks of COVID infection and where the risk is much higher from infection than from vaccination. It can be tricky at times because mass vaccination will generally affect more people than infection so you have to weigh the relative risks appropriately. However, in the current case where we have a highly infectious respiratory virus we seem destined to end up with an endemic disease which only happens when ~100% of the population has already been either vaccinated or infected. So to first approximation your only two choices are to get the vaccine or (eventually) get infected with COVID. Given that and the very clear data we have now about the relatively insignificant risks of the vaccine relative to infection, getting vaccinated should be the obvious best option. After all, getting infected with a novel virus that is (now) easily preventable is ALSO experimenting with your health.

[rcpt]

Funny that this is almost word-for-word what climate denialists say.

[whateveracct]

> Overall its just a slippery slop when you give the government this right. What happens if conservatives get in power and decided abortion should be banned outright as they consider a fetus a person? By the same logic you are using, they would be perfectly reasonable to do that.

This is a ridiculous argument and I'd say mostly FUD. Abortion is pretty well litigated. Conservatives have been in power in state and national govts for years and they've barely managed to get anywhere close to this.

[hellisothers]

While it’s possible to be infected and vaccinated the possibility is lower right, even “only” 40% is a huge number! If only vaccinated people are in a space it dramatically decreases the likelihood I’ll become infected by more than 40% because every one of those people is also personally 40% less likely to be infected, so this is compounding. Please correct me if I’m wrong on that assessment.

As to the hear disease comment those comparisons are disingenuous because you can choose to exercise or not and your choice doesn’t impact others. My 7yo son cannot be vaccinated, he has no choose but to rely on others doing their part

[keneda7]

I am not sure about the compounding 40%. I don't know enough about infectious disease transfer. The previous poster had asked about the 40% so I was giving him the source. Personally I agree with you 40% is still better than 0%.

As far as heart disease, in my opinion it does drastically impact other people. Heart disease patients take up hospital beds, they take up medical supplies, they take up doctors time. The CDC says ~1 in 4 deaths is due to heart disease. (https://www.cdc.gov/heartdisease/facts.htm) It is a massive drain on our medical system (perhaps the greatest).

[YooLi]

"To answer your last question (presumably non-rhetorical) I worry about unvaccinated people allowing for mutations via community spread..."

Then you also should worry about Antibody-Dependent Enhancement (ADE).

"...as well as getting sick when they didn't have to, hurting themselves while taking up healthcare resources in the process."

Like obese people?

[dragonwriter]

> My problem is that the whole thing is based on old data and a false premise that life is safe when vaccinated people are only around vaccinated people.

No, its not; its based on transmission being reduced and infections less dangerous among the vaccinated, which mitigates (though does not fully eliminate) the dangers of being fully open, and the policy judgement that the burden of requiring the (freely available) vaccine for such activity is warranted by the public health benefit.

[creato]

> My problem is that the whole thing is based on old data and a false premise that life is safe when vaccinated people are only around vaccinated people. We know this is slightly more true than among the unvaccinated, but only by about 40%. This is real data.

This is not "real data", it's not even clear what your number refers to. "Life is safe"?

[kevin_thibedeau]

New York state has an "Excelsior pass" that currently serves no purpose. You can use an app or print out a card with QR code to prove vaccination.

[dougmwne]

Yes, I am concerned about the "security theater" aspect of this. I want evidence that this is a valid approach, not moralizing. Otherwise we might as well start tossing virgins into Mount Etna for all the good it'll do.