Mennonite Measles in Texas

[JohnH]

I think I’ll just simply say that it is possible to have ethics avoid vaccines you believe are immoral and still take healthy appropriate precautions when you are sick or sickness is around.
If my children had measles, they would be confined for the recommended amount of time and I would not work for that time either unless I could guarantee that I would not bring it to work.
If I heard of measles in the school or in our community my children would not go to school and until measles was no longer the threat.

And if everyone did the same for a few days, and actually appropriately communicated the outbreak to the response teams… we would contain an outbreak pretty fast.

We already tried that "experiment" during COVID. It was impossible to contain, even with very draconian, authoritarian government measures taken.

[JohnH]

The idea we can control contagious disease is frankly ridiculous. When a cold is going around, everyone is going to get it.

The last time I had a bad cold or the flu was March 2020 right before the first COVID lockdowns. Since then, nothing. In fact, the flu all but disappeared during the first year of COVID.

... so you're saying the common cold has been eradicated?

Flu came back with a vengeance after the lockdowns were over and was fairly serious.

And the idea that we CAN'T control contagious diseases is ridiculous. We have controlled and eliminated many diseases that used to plague our society: Polio, smallpox, yellow fever, rubella, malaria, diphtheria, etc. And we are making progress on others like tuberculosis and HIV.

Yes, Ken, I'm aware you really like vaccines.

[Soloist]

I think I’ll just simply say that it is possible to have ethics avoid vaccines you believe are immoral and still take healthy appropriate precautions when you are sick or sickness is around.
If my children had measles, they would be confined for the recommended amount of time and I would not work for that time either unless I could guarantee that I would not bring it to work.
If I heard of measles in the school or in our community my children would not go to school and until measles was no longer the threat.

And if everyone did the same for a few days, and actually appropriately communicated the outbreak to the response teams… we would contain an outbreak pretty fast.

We already tried that "experiment" during COVID. It was impossible to contain, even with very draconian, authoritarian government measures taken.

I disagree that we actually tried effective measures. A bunch of states doing different things with maintaining full open air traffic… not closing the border… besides I wasn’t limiting it to the US efforts.

Either way we’ve circled this thing for years now and we’re never going to come to any conclusive agreement on Covid

[JohnH]

I disagree that we actually tried effective measures. A bunch of states doing different things with maintaining full open air traffic… not closing the border… besides I wasn’t limiting it to the US efforts.

Either way we’ve circled this thing for years now and we’re never going to come to any conclusive agreement on Covid

Which is why I cited the examples of Australia and New Zealand... where they did things like nobody in/out of the country, and travel wasn't even allowed between states.

In Melbourne you were allowed out of your house for exercise two hours a day and couldn't travel more than 3 miles from home when going for walks.

They still were completely unable to eradicate COVID and once they tried to lift any of these draconian restrictions, it went right back to a pandemic ripping through the country. At one point something like 30% of Australians had COVID.

[Soloist]

as I said, we’ve gone in circles over this and there really is no value discussing it.

[Silentreader]

....once they tried to lift any of these draconian restrictions, it went right back to being a pandemic...

Similar thing happened here in Ontario; when they opened restaurants for those with vaccination certificates to eat in...new infections multiplied. Whereas if they had stayed home?

[Ken]

....once they tried to lift any of these draconian restrictions, it went right back to being a pandemic...

Similar thing happened here in Ontario, when they opened restaurants for those with vaccination certificates to eat in...new infections multiplied. Whereas if they had stayed home?

The entire point of the initial restrictions in 2020 was to slow the spread of the disease during the initial months of the pandemic until effective treatments and vaccines could be developed. And to prevent the overwhelming of the health system with massive pulses of sick people (what they called bending the curve). We will never know how many lives were saved by doing that. But many were. No one thought the disease could be completely eradicated with a couple of weeks of lockdowns.

Once vaccines became widely in 2021 and other treatments became available the need for physical measures diminished and frankly became less effective as the disease evolved into much more contagious forms. Of course a lot of people continued to die on into 2022, especially those who didn't get vaccinated. One of the most eye-opening things about this whole pandemic was the number of people who chose to die rather than get vaccinated. I was acquainted with several of them.

[JohnH]

I was rather surprised to pull up the Queensland and UK recommended vaccination schedule and it doesn't even recommend the COVID-19 vaccine until age 75 (UK) or at all (Queensland).

That would contradict this narrative:

The entire point of the initial restrictions in 2020 was to slow the spread of the disease during the initial months of the pandemic until effective treatments and vaccines could be developed.

If the vaccine isn't even being recommended for anyone at all, there was no need to develop it.

[Ken]

I was rather surprised to pull up the Queensland and UK recommended vaccination schedule and it doesn't even recommend the COVID-19 vaccine until age 75 (UK) or at all (Queensland).

That would contradict this narrative:

The entire point of the initial restrictions in 2020 was to slow the spread of the disease during the initial months of the pandemic until effective treatments and vaccines could be developed.

If the vaccine isn't even being recommended for anyone at all, there was no need to develop it.

Riiiight.

I suppose you also remove the headlights from your car every morning since they are no longer needed. And throw out all your winter coats every spring because they are no longer needed as well.

[JohnH]

Riiiight.

I suppose you also remove the headlights from your car every morning since they are no longer needed. And throw out all your winter coats every spring because they are no longer needed as well.

If the DOT issued guidance that new cars should no longer have headlights, I would certainly be scratching my head and wondering what happened.