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by jmnicolas 1680 days ago
There is probably a wave of hospitalizations now like every year with the flu. When you average on a year it won't be as bad and won't justify trampling civil liberties.

It's just a power grab IMHO and people are so afraid of COVID they just go along. But sadly we won't get our freedoms back once all this is over.
1 comments
tzs 1680 days ago
A hurricane doesn't raise the average wind speed for the year at your house by much. Yet you can't ignore it.

If I were to press the business end of my soldering iron onto your hand it would only raise the average amount of thermal energy that your hand absorbs this year by a negligible amount. Yet I'm pretty sure you would very strongly object.

Hospitals in many areas are being overwhelmed to a far greater extent than they are in even bad flu years. When you are going to need a hospital for something in the future that you can be flexible with scheduling, then you just need a hospital that on average has enough capacity. When you need a hospital now with no flexibility in timing, all that matters is if demand now is above what the hospital can serve.

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jmnicolas 1680 days ago
You're right but does it justify the power grab anyway? What has been done since last year about hospitals capacity?

I can tell you that in France we have less beds than last year (not sure about intensive care though) and we fired quite a lot of unvaccinated nurses.

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malermeister 1679 days ago
What you're suggesting basically comes down to mitigation, which we've been having a lot of issues with.

I think what we actually need is a solution, so there's nothing left to mitigate. Imo mandatory vaccinations might be just that.

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jmnicolas 1679 days ago
The vaccine isn't efficient enough. Look at Gibraltar: 99% are vaccinated and they're still cancelling Christmas celebrations.
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malermeister 1679 days ago
Vaccination isn't a binary state. Protection wanes over time. I don't know where to get the data, but I'd guess that most people in Gibraltar have been vaccinated quite a while ago.

Maybe we need tighter schedules, i.e. one shot every two months? With delta, i think that's when effectiveness starts to wane.

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tzs 1679 days ago
Gibraltar is having a case surge, but they are having almost no deaths [1].

[1] https://graphics.reuters.com/world-coronavirus-tracker-and-m...

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