Obviously not getting vaccinated is dumb from a selfish point of view.
But it is unpleasantly selfish too.

90% efficacy means that 10% of those vaccinated are still vulnerable. Not getting vaccinated and not contributing to the herd effect is putting even the vaccinated elderly at risk.

Sputnik prevents even minor illness in 90% of cases, and both death and hospitalisation in 100%. Immunity, unlike sex, is non-binary.

I wonder how many people are mistakenly convinced that they had Covid and conclude that they wouldn’t benefit from the vaccine?

Is there any uptake of ivermectin in Russia?

The evidence for its efficacy seems to be mounting.

In the U.S., the phrase universally used by the media and get-vaccinated campaigns is “shots into arms.� I wonder how many people, upon hearing “arm,� imagine, in their mind’s eye, “arm.� As in a blood draw at the lab; an IV; a painful piercing of the antecubital fossa. Ouch. Yuck. Why not “shots into shoulders�? Lest you think that the above ridiculously under-estimates the medical sophistication of Americans, remember, prescription bottles of pills must now say “take by mouth.� In Russia, does the phraseology specify the arm?

It looks like the uk government is about to move the goalposts, yet again, on ending the UK’s quasi-lockdown. They initially promised to end this by Easter once the very vulnerable had been vaccinated, but extended it by four months and set a ridiculously long time for reopening in order to appease the committee of mini-Fauchis they’ve delegated all of their authority to; who, surprise surprise, have asked for yet another extension. Almost all olds are fully vaccinated and a majority of the rest of the adult population has had at least one shot. There’s a combination of variant hysteria and a small uptick in cases among unvaccinated pockets and people in their teens/early 20s that’s the excuse this time. The daily deaths are in single figures. They can get away with such brazen dishonesty because a large majority of the country is still hysterical about this, regardless of their vaccination status, and will support unlimited restrictions for an unlimited amount of time. If Lemoine is telling the truth, then most of Europe is even worse. It’s ironic, that Brezhneving Russia’s not-that-great corona figures has actually resulted in the vast majority of Russians having a higher quality of life than the vast majority of Europeans probably for the first time in history.

Paragraphs!

They can get away with such brazen dishonesty because a large majority of the country is still hysterical about this

1. Changing your plans according to changes in the situation is not “brazen dishonesty”.

2. The country wants an ultra low risk approach to opening up; so it makes sense for the democratically elected government to give it to them.

I also hate lockdowns, but the above two facts remain true.

How great that people can tell us we are stupid! I will continue to trust my body, rather than any politician or billionaire. Thank you very much.

2. The country wants an ultra low risk approach to opening up; so it makes sense for the democratically elected government to give it to them.

Ultra low risk is taking precautions until they’ve had the vaccine, this is more like zero hypothetical risk at extreme cost to themselves and others, without any acceptable end. Plus, there’s also the fact that any country that does achieve “Zero Covid” can then look forward to the very real risk of east German style exit visas for years like Australia.

If people, after having two doses of a vaccine which prevents transmission by well over ninety percent, and serious illness/death by considerably more, for a disease with a not hideously high fatality rate to start with, in a largely vaccinated population with very low circulation anyway are still demanding others wear rags across their faces and social distance with the full force of the law, then the non-hysterical 30% or so of the population are quite morally correct to tell them to go and do one.

If you don’t like Sputnik V for whatever reason, you now get the choice of getting the Vector Institute’s EpiVacCorona instead.

Unlike Sputnik, EpiVacCorona (based on what is known about it) gives zero protection against coronavirus. Although this can be considered as another measure for population selection (idiots who are not able to understand the effectiveness of vaccines will be vaccinated with EpiVacCorona)

S

putnik prevents even minor illness in 90% of cases, and both death and hospitalisation in 100%. Immunity, unlike sex, is non-binary.

There have never been 100% effective vaccines in the history of mankind, and Sputnik is no exception. Undoubtedly, there are those who were vaccinated, and then went to the hospital with covid, for sure, there are also those who died from the crown. The vaccine reduces the probability of such an outcome tenfold, but does not give a 100% guarantee

Do you know any 20 somethings? Ask them about their friends and Covid right now.

It is ~100% against death. Even with no vaccine, Covid is ~100% against death!

I got COVID the old-fashioned way, but am considering getting vaxxed anyway, and my options are Sputnik or EpiVacCorona.

What’s with EpiVacCorona? Supposedly, there is some Telegram of trial participants complaining about lack of effectivity and illness after the second shot. Legit, or more black PR?

They can still get the Western vaccines in Russia right?

If Sputnik is the Russian equivalent of AstraZeneca and EpiVac akin to Phizer/Modena then the latter will probably have fewer or no side effects. Anecdotally, everyone I know who took the AZ one had mild flu-like symptoms the following day (I think AK said he had that from Sputnik, can’t remember), everyone (including myself) who took the Phizer one had a mildly sore arm the following day, about half as bad as from a flu shot.

Every time I get ill, I tell myself “this is the worst”, “I’ve never felt like this”, “let me die”.

Given this, I could easily convince myself that every illness was some uniquely awful event, but my perception of time makes everything in the past feel present, making the pattern of internal melodrama obvious.

I notice that many other people don’t have this so pronounced, even when I remind them of what they said the many times before.

On the same phenomenon, I don’t think I’ve passed a single year without almost everyone I know, at some point, offering that the weather is particularly strange and never been like this before.

If you’re a twenty something with a health condition that makes you more susceptible to a nasty case of corona then you’d have been offered both jabs months ago.

The interesting thing about WFH is that a few of my colleagues caught this and continued to work through it. One was completely asymptomatic, the other had flu-like symptoms for a week with anosmia that took about six weeks to resolve. Both caught it (if they were being honest) from their spouses who caught it at work.

That’s anecdotal of course. It’s been known for months that a healthy 20-something has a very low chance of dying of this thing and a low but non-trivial chance of getting very sick. Anosmia dragging on for weeks is probably very unpleasant, but then so are endless restrictions. I’ve said this many times before, but it just highlights how nuts things were for Yanks: going on a date was a criminal offense from October to May in most of the UK and our health Taliban was screaming to prevent that stupid rule being relaxed then.

The US has been overcounting Covid deaths in large part because an elderly person dying of covid is more lucrative to the hospital than one who dies of pneumonia or ‘complications from this that or the other thing’. I noticed this sometime ago when mortality figures were always lowest on Sunday and Monday. My guess was that hospital administrators wanted to review the weekend expired patient cases before doctors listed a cause of death on the death certificate.

It got absurd in some cases. 45 year old man admitted to the trauma unit for injuries sustained in a motorcycle accident tests positive for covid ( all hospital admissions are tested) so if he dies during surgery cause of death is listed as covid especially if he was uninsured. Its a fair bet that if Officer Chauvin had gotten up to answer his cellphone and George Floyd died lying in the gutter by himself his death would have been listed as covid as the receiving hospital would have gotten no money if the cause of death was listed as overdose of fentanyl and methamphetamine.

Other countries have other reasons to keep the covid death toll down. Peru just admitted their figures were grossly understated but since they were having an election and couldn’t do anything about it anyway why frighten the public.

Epivac corona is not an mRNA vaccine but a peptide based vaccine.

Its efficacy data is iffy and has been cleared for use in Turkmenistan besides Russia.

Sputnik is similar to AZ but uses two different human viruses as carriers instead of a Chimpanzee virus in the case of AstraZeneca.

Astra Zeneca has proved very effective in preventing hospitalization during the second covid wave in India. 100% of the people covered by my company insurance who took one dose of it(i.e. a sample of 1000 people all above 45 years of age) either did not get Covid or had mild symptoms and none required hospitalization or supplemental oxygen.

There are similar anecdotal evidence of its effectiveness across the country.

Sputnik should be even better after two doses.

Russia’s 11% vaccination rate lags far behind the Anglo-American (~50%) and EU (~30%) rate

Comparing the percentage of fully vaccinated people makes this less of an embarrassment. Only by a bit, though.

Around 10 % in Russia vs 42 % in the UK/US and 22 % in the EU.

I think it’s fairly clear, notwithstanding all the “virtue-signalling” among the self-styled “intellectuals,” is that if covid had been ignored there would have been little public awareness that it was actually happening.

Which country do you live in?

…if covid had been ignored there would have been little public awareness that it was actually happening.

Precisely. The reality that vaxers (like AK) cannot admit is that 15% increase in mortality concentrated among elderly and sick is not a catastrophe. It is within normal bounds. One doesn’t have to go nuts.

Today vaxers are motivated for everyone to pump the miraculous liquid into their veins. They are committed and unsure about what they did. Misery loves company and AK wouldn’t feel like a potential fool. Maybe 90% of people in Russia are the smart ones. They may not have high IQ’s but have a higher Biological Q more important evolutionary (BQ, I will patent it:).

In a scenario where the vaccinated develop long-term complications it will be interesting to see their reaction. They will probably still blame the unvaccinated. In any case, they have the annual refresher shot to look forward – some will line up for decades, year after year. Is that really smart? Was it done with other vaccines?

Idk russia and other countries which wont get vaccinated/cant control virus are fucked. Maybe some African countries can take it since most of their population is under 40 years old but that is not the case in Russia.

And if there will be few million deaths in Russia + millions of long term damaged people – then quite many will be angry and will want some revenge. Same thing in Brasil and elsewhere.

Dangerous times.

Well, the funeral industry would have noticed a spike in revenue. Actuaries and life insurance companies would also notice. BTW, seems looking at changes in actuary figures would be a good way to get data not tainted by political bias.

Probably we can project fewer deaths than normal in the next few years since many of the vulnerable have already succumbed. From that you could calculate the average number of life years lost from a COVID death.

Another extremely interesting number that should be calculated is the age at which a vaccination becomes positive EV. I assume it’s negative for a 5 year old. Aren’t there mathematicians we can trust to crunch these numbers?

Those who don’t will just die 5-10 years earlier, on average. Not that big of a deal in the grand scheme of things, there are people who smoke and people who abuse alcohol, after all, effect on life expectancy will probably be similar. Again, 🤷.

Strictly speaking, it will be better for them since people live too long doing nothing but consuming all the resources they manged to save rather than passing it to their heirs. So if anti-vaxxers are dumber than average the effect will be dysgenic.

Flu comes every year, usually several times. It has always been this way. Each outbreak is slightly different. The weak and the elderly sometimes die from it.

There seems to be not much in the way of general excess deaths anywhere. One would expect a noticeable spike if there was a deadly virus around. This pandemic is mostly a mental problem. Vaccinating against flu is a losing proposition. Mutates too fast. There is no real protection.

Humans are known for driving each other mad with fear.

Boris Johnson is an incompetent leader in the pandemic – UK’s weak and late lockdowns, insufficient travel restrictions, and release of coronavirus patients to elderly homes, has resulted in tens of thousands of additional deaths.

Johnson was not insightful enough to predict the small and temporary economic impact of lockdowns*, and in early months had also seemed confused by a misunderstood concept of “herd immunity”.

However, by comparison with in Russia, UK’s management of the pandemic has been competent and successful. In Russia, there have been around 550,000 deaths already from coronavirus, if excess deaths are an indicator. There has been lack of transparency in the medical statistics. And I’m not sure why people would try to excuse the blame of the authorities for the slow vaccination rate (which I had been posting about in December) or to blame citizens for this, as if vaccination rollout is not part of state capacity.

–

* There has been instant economic boom in response to stopping of lockdown. In other words, consumption was just temporarily delayed for a few months by lockdowns (I wrote in March 2020 https://www.unz.com/akarlin/accelerated-sinotriumph/#comment-3808161 ), without any serious economic effects – although governments’ financial positions has been eroded.

I have followed your writing on corona and vaccination and you are in general a moderate. But the moderate approach has led to a cul-de-sac: either vaccinate 100’s of millions with untested vaccines (mainly MRNA’s) or restrict society semi-permanently. Those are drastic remedies that you support. The question is what problem are we trying to solve? If you favour the drastic remedies – vaccinate! or else – you must consider corona to be a very serious problem. The word catastrophe was mine – I don’t believe you used it and I didn’t say you did. But your views make little sense if you don’t see corona as a catastrophe.

The reality is that corona has not been a catastrophe. You belatedly distinguish the situation for the elderly and the young – that is a key point so throwing around numbers like “only 10% are vaccinated” or 22% in EU, is misleading. Most of the 90% unvaccinated are not elderly. I generally agree that the elderly should get the vaccine, but it makes no sense for the young.

…you’ll probably have more people taking yearly Corona vaccines than currently take yearly flu vaccines. Those who don’t will just die 5-10 years earlier

That is both wrong and rather flippant. Nothing in the data indicates that unvaccinated elderly would die 5-10 years earlier – the mortality rate for over 80 is 4-5%. You also ignore any vaccination side effects. An untested vaccine is probably going to have them and some have been covered extensively even in the main stream media (inflammation of the heart muscle in young men, trombosis, etc…). Yesterday Austria said that they have settled 14 cases for vaccination side effects – no details were released. Given that it takes a long time to prove anything to governments and that vaccination is in early stages in Austria this is a sign of things to come. You cannot assert that you know that “they are safe” – even the pharma companies don’t go that far. Given that it is risk against risk it should be up to each individual.

Now a money question: can you clearly state whether you are in favour of vaccinating the young, or children? We can all agree on the elderly, but how about everyone else?

non-hysterical 30%

Wearing masks adequately (especially ffp2 or ffp3) and following anti-epidemic guidelines like ventilation of indoor spaces, would have saved millions of lives in the world, saved millions of hours of illness, reduced the need for lockdowns, and also reduced the need for vaccine.

non-hysterical 30%

Responsible behaviour and even lockdowns (which were required to a greater extent, due to irresponsible behaviour of many individuals), was also for most citizens, not very inconvenient.

So you have to see a film at home, instead of cinema. Or go to takeaway instead of eating in a restaurant. Or meet with 3 friends instead of 6. Or to spend time with your children at home.

That any people (excluding of owners of small businesses, who have their economic self-interest) was complaining about this during a pandemic in which risks were not fully known and would be solved easier early than late, shows how spoilt many citizens of first world countries have become.

We see effects of historically unprecedented levels of luxury and comfort on an animal, who was designed for, and for most of its history, not one thousandth of the convenience experienced in daily life of average people living in 21st century developed countries. Psychologically, many people are not adapted for the levels of comfort and luxury they have experienced all their lives, and the result is people complaining about wearing a mask when they go to a shop.

has been access to vaccination for months now

Production has also been slow, as predicted. There was only 33 million doses of vaccine produced in Russia by middle of May.

This is slightly slower than we knew in January. https://www.unz.com/akarlin/open-thread-136/#comment-4423050

To the extent the Russian state can be faulted, it’s for an insufficiently active pro-vaccination propaganda

If there was only 33 million doses produced in Russia by last month, then there could be at most 22% vaccination. Although it had been correctly targeted at over 60 year old people only (and combined with a law on this topic for compulsory vaccination, as well as not sending any vaccines to foreign countries) – this quantity of vaccine production would have been sufficient to end the vast majority of deaths.

commended for not bothering people with lockdowns

I don’t see this.

Likely one of the worst incompetency which was seen by authorities this year, was insufficiently early and strict lockdowns during vaccine rollouts.

This mistake was easily seen in countries where false confidence has been created by efficient vaccine rollout – e.g. especially we saw it early this year in Israel and Hungary.

In countries like Hungary and Israel, the greatest number of the deaths, occurred during the vaccine rollout. An earlier and stricter lockdown, would have resulted not only in thousands less deaths from 3rd wave coronavirus in those countries, but also a faster return to normal life.

Hungary is finally returning to normal life this month, much later (and with far more dead people) than would have been with an earlier and stricter lockdown at the beginning of this year, when their otherwise efficient vaccine rollout was initiating.

“fundamental problem in Russia (as per above) is not lack of vaccines” – Are you sure? What if the 10-15% vaccination rate reflects the available supply of vaccine and also explains why more intense vaccination campaign that would increase the demand for it was not launched in Russia. Is it possible that Kremlin rather sells the vaccine abroad for hard currency and for good PR than have Russians vaccinated?

Mexico cites Russia’s Sputnik vaccine production problems (May 11, 2021)
https://apnews.com/article/europe-russia-mexico-coronavirus-pandemic-coronavirus-vaccine-cd83a5850f8384fbb364890ef583e5f0

“Russian authorities have been having so many problems producing second doses of their Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine that Russia probably will be unable to supply enough to people who already got the first dose, Mexican officials said Monday.”

Some countries produce (will produce) Sputnik V:

Sputnik V vaccine production starts in India; 100 million doses to be produced annually (May 27, 2021)
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/industry/healthcare/biotech/pharmaceuticals/covid-19-sputnik-v-production-starts-in-india-100-million-doses-to-be-produced-annually/articleshow/82910177.cms?from=mdr

Serbia and Argentina start producing Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine (Jun 4, 2021)
https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/serbia-argentina-start-producing-russias-sputnik-v-vaccine-2021-06-04/

Russia looks to China to help produce its Sputnik V COVID-19 vaccine (May 3, 2021)
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/russia-looks-to-china-to-help-produce-its-sputnik-v-covid-19-vaccine-01620023486

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has said demand for Sputnik V significantly exceeds Russia’s domestic production capacity.

There has been instant economic boom in response to stopping of lockdown. In other words, consumption was just temporarily delayed for a few months by lockdowns

Lol no. There is no instant economic boom in response to stopping of lockdown.

It looks like a big spike but only because it is from a very low base, deep down from the hole.

Rather it is a long catch up to 2019 economic levels (in the EU or UK) that will happen only by 2022.

In Russia, the economy will catch up by autumn 2021. Same in the US, with 5 trillion in crisis stimulus, though. Otherwise the US would have faced a great depression.

Overall, the global economy lost 2 years due to the corona pandemic, plus it added more debt compared to before pandemic trajectories.

There are also long term scarring effects – due to long term health issues, a drop in TFR, children not visiting school lowering the quality of the labor force, higher debt depressing economic growth, etc.

https://www.oecd.org/education/The-economic-impacts-of-coronavirus-covid-19-learning-losses.pdf

Lol

https://mobile.twitter.com/ScottishSikh/status/1380469448855916545

https://mobile.twitter.com/jasveermuktsar/status/1386244426335281156

https://mobile.twitter.com/amaanbali/status/1402121118350151683

COVID-19 vaccine: Here’s why Russia is struggling to make Sputnik V doses (May 14, 2021)
https://www.businesstoday.in/sectors/pharma/covid-19-vaccine-here-why-russia-is-struggling-to-make-sputnik-v-doses/story/439057.html

President Vladimir Putin has trumpeted the vaccine around the world, and said in March that Russia had signed agreements for the production of 700 million doses of Sputnik V vaccine abroad. But Russia had produced just 33 million vaccines as of May 12 and exported fewer than 15 million, according to a Reuters tally that counted each vaccine as consisting of two doses.

If the numbers are true, the vaccination rate in Russia equals the vaccine available supply. It could be increased at most by the factor of two if vaccines were not exported. So at best vaccination rate in Russia could be 20%. So I do not think that skeptics and anti-vaxxers have any impact on the vaccination rate in Russia. While the subject of anti-vaxxers and other neo-obscuratists are always interesting as psychological and sociological phenomena Karlin’s focus on them serves to obscure the discrepancy between Russia’s PR success of Sputnik V vaccine and the Russia’s inability to produce the vaccine.

No, brazen dishonesty is pretending this virus is especially dangerous and these vaccines are necessary (to say nothing of their safety or efficacy).

I resent being vaccinated and still being formally obligated to wear a mask on the Metro and other public indoor places

lmao

seethe

90% efficacy means that 10% of those vaccinated are still vulnerable.

The efficacy claims for the Western Corona Chan “vaccines” (pFizer, Moderna, Astrazeneca, Johnson & Johnson) are basically just nonsense, or more strictly speaking, irrelevant metrics to convince the public that these “vaccines” are way more effective than they actually are. Most people still haven’t grasped the fact that even the American CDC and the “vaccine” manufacturers themselves openly admit that their “vaccines” neither prevent one from catching or spreading Corona Chan.

In Russia, does the phraseology specify the arm?

Mr. Karlin, why another post about this topic that’s little more than insults directed to those who haven’t decided to take the shot(s)?

Be that as it may, though, there’s clearly a difference between being in the Corona demographic risk group and dying because you do not have access to a vaccine because of state distribution failure, and dying because you are too lazy, paranoid, and/or have had your brain destroyed by conspiracy theories to get vaccinated. These people’s obstinacy makes life modestly more uncomfortable than it has to be (e.g. I resent being vaccinated and still being formally obligated to wear a mask on the Metro and other public indoor places). But the key point is that to the extent they now die of Corona, it is now through their own conscious choices – that is, it is now more of a Darwin Award than a tragedy. If one is of a cynical disposition, one might even salute their unwitting sacrifice for the Russian budget and pensions system.

You may console yourself for now with demeaning your intellectual inferiors, but only time will tell who has made the correct decision.

For months Russian state TV presented coronavirus as a foreign problem. Their priority was to protect Putin’s approval rating. There is definitely not enough fear in the population – Russians simply do not understand why they need to be vaccinated.

The core reason while vaccination rates remain low is now clearly dominated by the fact that the post-Soviet environment is one of the world’s most ideologically anti-vaxx…

Low trust in state institutions (post-Soviets, HK, many parts of the US) is correlated with high levels of antivaxx sentiments since the current COVID vaccination drive is predominantly a state and globalist effort (cue contract tracing apps and vaccine passports), and much of the medical establishment is seen as being co-opted for political goals. This and your WEF “conspiracy theories”. Besides, COVID is highly transmissible but not lethal enough to justify total vaccination campaigns (in this regard more like annual flu outbreaks than one of those vaccines children obtain), and much of the case number data is compromised by way of loose PCR tests. 10% coverage in Russia and 50% in the US are already astounding achievements.

Putin could go Schwab’s preferred way and mandate vaccine passports for even obtaining daily needs and services, but this would immediately tank his support, Lukashenko would laugh at him and it wouldn’t do a lot anyway (since Russians had experience with shortage economies and informal markets, and they could go back to it). We’ll see the birth of a global informal economy in opposition to the one gate-kept by vaccine enforcers.

I can’t stress these enough and I’m already very weary of all these COVID vaccine b*llshit – This is why I kept off commenting here until now and won’t reply to anything on this thread other than replies to this comment.

Someone asked an Amish fellow why the Amish don’t get COVID. His answer? “Because we don’t have television”.

There are two reasons for it: Vaccine efficacy of 90-95% initially was determined using symptom based diagnosis. The possibility of symptomless vaccinated virus spreaders might be real. The second reason is masking enforcement. It is just too complicated to distinguish maskless vaccinated from maskless idiots.

Pending evidence of long term safety, I am encouraged there are some holdouts who can serve as controls. The Darwin Award may yet go to those who again put their faith in Big Pharma.

p.s. How dare anyone suggest that greed might be a central motive behind the effort to vaccinate every person, er creature, that walks on God’s green earth? I dunno. Vioxx. Oxycontin. Margarine, “the healthy alternative”…

https://www.bangkokpost.com/thailand/general/2123879/thai-company-to-import-worlds-first-pet-vaccine

Normal people know what to do. Get vaccinated seems like best option, so people go for it.
Really, there’s not much to debate. If you’re not get vaccinated. Well, that’s pity. I don’t care at this point. Funny, that anti vaxx people talk more about vaccines. All my family who got vaccinated just move on with life.
Also, there’s not much to debate. Covid-19 moved from healthcare problem to religious for some people.

As I recall, it was precisely the Daily Stormer-type rightoids and “groypers� who were ranting about how Corona was going to kill everyone in February 2020, before doing a volte face and claiming it was a “hoax� from around April-May 2020.

Ron Unz’z (April 27, 2020) take on Anglin’s volte:

https://www.unz.com/mwhitney/lifting-the-lockdown-easy-does-it/?showcomments#comment-3863472

I remember around March, Anglin was freely saying the whole thing was going to be a total disaster in America due to Trump’s incompetence, and huge numbers of people would die. And I think he even said how shocked he was at how absurdly easily the Trump people were finding it to deflect the blame on China, even though that made absolutely no sense.

So I suspect that he realized the “China bioweapon� story was just too well entrenched among (gullible) right-wing activists to be easily dislodged with more plausible information when the topic really became hot in America around then. And he decided to launch a clever flank attack instead, and focus on the “It’s Just the Flu!!!� nonsense, which had also been floating around in fringe circles.

Based on the comments to that ZeroHedge article someone linked, it seems to have worked perfectly. The “China bioweapon� people at ZeroHedge are apparently getting totally swamped by the “It’s Just the Flu!!� people. After all, if It’s Just the Flu! how can anyone blame China?

An utu’s take:

https://www.unz.com/article/the-jared-kushner-strategy-obviously-backfired/?showcomments#comment-4276710

My reasoning is based on the cui bono position. I really do not know from where “It’s Just the Flu!!� meme spread and who seeded it first but if you are correct that Anglin played a significant role in it and his objective, as you posit, was to sabotage the “Chinese bioweapon� meme then he did what any Chinese agent of influence should/would have done. If Anglin was the first stone that helped to kill two birds: (1) sabotage “Chinese bioweapon� meme and (2) contribute to the erratic response to the virus in America that significantly will weaken America vis-à-vis China, China should give him a medal even if his driving force was just a spite and antics of the performance artists.

I do not think that our speculative takes are that much different except that I accept a possibility of malice playing a role in Chinese actions. Perhaps because I am more cynical or less idealistic about the purity of Chinese hearts that are not above wishing us ill and not above acting on the wishes.

Dude, there are Twitter video of people roaming empty vaccination station in Russia. There is no point to debate covid-19 with people like you.

Karlin’s focus on them serves to obscure the discrepancy between Russia’s PR success of Sputnik V vaccine and the Russia’s inability to produce the vaccine.

I can fully confirm what Karlin said. For many months, people can be vaccinated by Sputnic without any problems – in polyclinics, shopping centers, at field vaccination points, at work, etc. In some regions (as well as in many enterprises) those who are vaccinated receive money

So I do not think that skeptics and anti-vaxxers have any impact on the vaccination rate in Russia.

In the case of Russia, they are the decisive factor. If they were not there, restrictions related to the volume of production would begin to apply, but in the current reality, there are more vaccines than those who want to be vaccinated

For months Russian state TV presented coronavirus as a foreign problem. …. There is definitely not enough fear in the population – Russians simply do not understand why they need to be vaccinated.

That’s not true. In addition to state propaganda on television, in the spring and early summer of 2020, the authorities broadcast several times a day from a loudspeaker that Covid is a deadly danger,and precautions must be taken. One of the main arguments of the Russian white trash – “I do not believe in the coronavirus because it is constantly promoted by the state media”

Israel, Hungary and Russia deaths/million are 689, 3,102 and 858, respectively. However Russia is severely undercounted. Possibly by factor of 6.7 according to Karlinsky and Kobak:

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.01.27.21250604v1.full.pdf

I think that Hungary just like Czechia and Poland blew it long before they had any prospects of getting vaccines. There is a question whether they really blew it or it was an intentional decision of feigning ineptitude, which in their cases did not take much effort, to emulate Sweden. I wonder whether they were aware that with their socio-economic profile and population density the Swedish result of 1,430 deaths/million would be multiplied.

You misunderstand, I was laughing at the vaxxed-up maskcuck who still has to wear his cuckmuzzle, and isn’t happy about it. So much for “It’s no big deal, guys, just wear one! I can breathe just fine!”

You, obviously, will not share this laugh. I hope you too enjoy suffering the full panoply of ridiculous corona theatre despite doing your part to help big pharma recover the money they’d sunk into mRNA moon pie.

Remember: all of this was unnecessary; it all could have been avoided if people like yourself had come to your senses sooner; it will never end until you do; and until that time, you lose all right to complain about having to wear a mask.

empty vaccination station in Russia

And every other country in the world

We can’t trust these people. It could be there is a higher death rate but it is caused by higher levels of euthanasia and other reasons related to shut-downs and delayed medical treatments.

We see effects of historically unprecedented levels of luxury and comfort on an animal, who was designed for, and for most of its history, not one thousandth of the convenience experienced in daily life of average people living in 21st century developed countries. Psychologically, many people are not adapted for the levels of comfort and luxury they have experienced all their lives, and the result is people complaining about wearing a mask when they go to a shop.

Possibly this is one explanation for some of the anti-lockdown feeling that can be seen. It might be some kind of evolved intuition about the dangers of trying to create a risk free environment, particularly when it looks like it is being done for the benefit of the very old members of the group, and this could also be at the expense of births of children from the young.

Continuing from last month’s discussion, here’s a link:

https://www.pnas.org/content/118/4/e2014564118

Big pharma is not making a lot of money, as evidenced by their lackluster stock market performance.

But it’s interesting that you trust this artificially enhanced chimerical virus straight out of a lab more than a vaccine literally doing a fraction of what the virus itself does.

Russia’s development of one of the world’s most effective vaccines, Sputnik V, which boasts an efficacy rate of >90% ….

Yes, that is the Relative Risk Reduction (RRR) they report, but do you have any idea of its Absolute Risk Reduction (ARR)?

For the vaxxes preferred in the West, the RRRs are mostly reported as >90%, but for all of them the ARR is less than 1%.

Relative risk reduction and absolute risk reduction measures in the evaluation of clinical trial data are poorly understood by health professionals and the public. The absence of reported absolute risk reduction in COVID-19 vaccine clinical trials can lead to outcome reporting bias that affects the interpretation of vaccine efficacy. The present article uses clinical epidemiologic tools to critically appraise reports of efficacy in Pfzier/BioNTech and Moderna COVID-19 mRNA vaccine clinical trials. Based on data reported by the manufacturer for Pfzier/BioNTech vaccine BNT162b2, this critical appraisal shows: relative risk reduction, 95.1%; 95% CI, 90.0% to 97.6%; p = 0.016; absolute risk reduction, 0.7%; 95% CI, 0.59% to 0.83%; p < 0.000. For the Moderna vaccine mRNA-1273, the appraisal shows: relative risk reduction, 94.1%; 95% CI, 89.1% to 96.8%; p = 0.004; absolute risk reduction, 1.1%; 95% CI, 0.97% to 1.32%; p < 0.000. Unreported absolute risk reduction measures of 0.7% and 1.1% for the Pfzier/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines, respectively, are very much lower than the reported relative risk reduction measures. Reporting absolute risk reduction measures is essential to prevent outcome reporting bias in evaluation of COVID-19 vaccine efficacy.

source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7996517/pdf/medicina-57-00199.pdf

Do a little more research, and you’ll learn that all of the vaxxes have had tens of thousands of deaths and even more cases of non-fatal serious adverse events reported within a couple weeks, which are being dismissed in most cases as merely “coinciding� with the recent vaccination (kind of the opposite of COVID19 reporting, where COVID19 was linked to any death within 28 days of a positive test). The spike protein that is the basis for all the vaxxes is itself pathological, causing things like clotting, myocarditis, and other effects that the “experts� claimed were not likely but are because the spikes do get into the blood stream to wreak havoc.

What is the adverse event history for Sputnik? I hope it is better than those for the other vaxxes.

When 90% of supply is bought by public and the remaining 10% is exported and some is still lingering on shelves I can believe that the equilibrium between supply and demand has been reached. This is the case with 50 tons of black caviar that Russia produces. If however Kremlin decided to spend money on advertisement campaign that caviar is good for you and that eating caviar is a patriotic duty of every Russian then there would be caviar shortage and people would stand in lines for it. It does not make sense for Kremlin to make Eat the Black Caviar campaign because practically all of produced caviar is already consumed.

Would it make sense for Kremlin to make intensive vaccination campaign if all produced vaccines are already utilized? No. That’s why there are no lines for vaccines because raising demand does not make sense. If anything lowering demand is in Kremlin’s interest because Kremlin prioritizes export for political reasons. Russian anti-vacxxers and Karlin who blames them while winking his eye are working hand in hand with Kremlin to help Kremlin obscure how pathetically low is Russia’s capacity for vaccine production and the fact that Kremlin cynically prioritizes foreigners over Russians by exporting almost 50% of produced vaccines.

Russia delivers Sputnik V vaccine to St Petersburg after shortage problems (March 19, 2021)
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-russia-vaccine-sho/russia-delivers-sputnik-v-vaccine-to-st-petersburg-after-shortage-problems-idUSKBN2BB1QX

Since then several Russian regions, excluding Moscow, have reported shortages, with some Russians voicing frustration about Russia sending vaccines abroad, arguing that more shots should be made available at home.

In St Petersburg, Russia’s second-largest city, there has been a shortage of the first component of the two-shot vaccine in more than 30 out of around 120 vaccination points, said Olga Ryabinina, the local health committee’s spokeswoman.

Russia delivers Sputnik V vaccine to St Petersburg after shortage problems (March 19,

So it was in March, and the problem was relative (the number of vaccination points temporarily decreased). But this situation was corrected after a week. Now in St. Petersburg there is a huge surplus of opportunities to vaccinate – there are even vaccination points working at night (apparently for the convenience of vaccinating vampires)

Interesting that an image which states Nobel Prize winner Luc Montagnier’s view on the Western Corona Chan “vaccines” has been removed. Luc Montagnier’s emphatic opposition to the “vaccines” compared to their apparent endorsement by Mr. Karlin doesn’t put this in a good light.

I got COVID the old-fashioned way, but am considering getting vaxxed anyway, and my options are Sputnik or EpiVacCorona.

Then get vaccinated Sputnik V. EpiVacCorona according to published data is an extremely ineffective vaccine

If Sputnik is the Russian equivalent of AstraZeneca and EpiVac akin to Phizer/Modena then the latter will probably have fewer or no side effects.

Sputnik is NOT an analog of Astrazeneca, but rather a combination of the Covidence and Johnson &Johnson vaccines. In terms of side effects and effectiveness, the Sputnik roughly corresponds to mRNA vaccines (judging by the information that is known). EpiVacCorona is apparently a non-working vaccine.

no side effects.

These vaccines have side effects

As I recall, it was precisely the Daily Stormer-type rightoids and “groypers� who were ranting about how Corona was going to kill everyone in February 2020, before doing a volte face and claiming it was a “hoax� from around April-May 2020.

The grainy videos from China with people staggering around and falling down in the street were a bit concerning. Could have been fake, but one may then wonder why.

Regarding le volte face, did we all hug a chinese like the great and good told us back in Feb 2020? Face masks unnecessary until everybody important had been supplied, then required. Herd immunity will save us then no herd immunity possible. I suppose it goes on.

We have at least three more left to consider: masks work/don’t work, lockdowns work/don’t work, closed borders work/don’t work (but migrants always welcome).

Given that we don’t even seem to have a clear idea of how Corona spreads, the risk seems considerable that vaxx passports will be ultimately useless too.

If there was a real danger, if people saw others dying, or becoming violently ill, there would be no reason for the massive propaganda campaign pushing these gene therapy shots. People aren’t getting the shot because they are capable of looking around and seeing it isn’t necessary. The ‘experts’ were wrong. It’s okay that they were wrong, covid was an unknown entity a year and a half ago. Trouble is, they’ve invested so much energy in a false narrative, it would hurt their egos to admit they overhyped how bad covid was.

.. and now it’s back again.

Am I having a stroke?

When 90% of supply is bought by public and the remaining 10% is exported and some is still lingering on shelves I can believe that the equilibrium between supply and demand has been reached. This is the case with 50 tons of black caviar that Russia produces. If however Kremlin decided to spend money on advertisement campaign that caviar is good for you and that eating caviar is a patriotic duty of every Russian then there would be caviar shortage

Have you ever heard of cases where people received money for eating black caviar? Some companies pay employees 10,000 rubles (about $ 130) for vaccination

prescription bottles of pills must now say “take by mouth.�

Cue Mr Bean trying to grab some off the shelf like that.

Are you guys insane? There is a 99.7% survival rate for people who get the disease. Only the very elderly and those with serious co-morbidities risk death from the virus. A year ago, when we didn’t have all the stats, your position was arguable. Now that we know it was mostly hype, can you guys stop and just admit you were wrong? Why not?

But it’s interesting that you trust this artificially enhanced chimerical virus straight out of a lab more than a vaccine literally doing a fraction of what the virus itself does.

Nice false dichotomy there. Wrapped in a straw man too.

“There is a 99.7% survival rate for people who get the disease.” – IFR=0.3% is too low. Early estimates of IFR=0.8% to 1% seem to remain to be valid for countries with European level of medical care and age demographic profile. If IFR was 0.3% Hungary would have to be over 100% infected and countries like Czechia over 94% infected. And also Russia would have to be over 100% infected if it was true its stats are underestimated by factor larger than 3.5.

i too would be interested in ak’s take on the ivermectin controversy. im a little surprised to note that the subject has been given far more attention at left-liberal naked capitalism than by any unz author, but then again these are very strange times.

https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2021/05/i-dont-know-of-a-bigger-story-in-the-world-right-now-than-ivermectin-ny-times-best-selling-author.html

„Big Pharma is not making a lot of money“? Many readily available sources to the contrary:

https://www.newsweek.com/big-pharma-companies-profits-industries-study-1490407

Do you mean that they‘re not making much profit off the billions of vaccine shots that have been mandated or coerced by governments and big corporate employers? What‘s the basis for that counterintuitive assertion?

You make a fair point about the real possibility that this virus was intentionally made more contagious and/or more lethal by evil governments, whether „ours“ or China‘s or both. But it‘s possible for this to be true, and still conclude that government and corporations systematically exaggerated the virus‘s lethality to frighten people into giving up much more liberty and property (and further enrich Big Pharma through a succession of required „vaccines“ and annual booster shots).

In terms of side effects and effectiveness, the Sputnik roughly corresponds to mRNA vaccines (judging by the information that is known).

I have so far seen no reports at all of adverse effects from the Sputnik V vaccine used in over 60 nations around the world.

If you have access to any such reports, it would be helpful to provide this information for others to investigate.

Meanwhile, the pFizer and Moderna mRNA seem to be the most deadly of all the Corona Chan “vaccines”, outpacing all other contenders for the most serious adverse events and fatalities.

(https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/experimental-vaccine-death-rate-for-israels-elderly-40-times-higher-than-covid-19-deaths-researchers ]

(https://www.bitchute.com/video/bSxEe9RS0P29/ ]

FWIW, the mRNA “vaccines” from pFizer and Moderna seem to be the gift that just keeps on giving, with new surprises (not disclosed by pFizer and Moderna) being discovered weekly. For example, take this gem –

Magnetofection – Magnetic Components Deliberately Inserted into pFizer & Moderna mRNA “Vaccines”

(https://www.bitchute.com/video/bHthoQmn3lFl/ ]
(https://zb10-7gsop1v78.bitchute.com/r8wq75doLqKP/bHthoQmn3lFl.mp4 ]

If one were prone to speculation, one might wonder just how these undisclosed features of the Moderna and pFizer mRNA “vaccines” are designed to interact with the already planned “booster shots” and whatever other new surprises they may have in store for us.

Do you also believe that the coercive seatbelt and helmet laws are a plot by the industries that produce those products, for the purpose of self-enrichment at the expense of our freedom?

A young (<25) and otherwise healthy co-worker of mine that sits next to me at work came down with a debilitating bout of Covid-19 in mid-May, that kept her out of the office till the beginning of June. She experienced most of the symptoms and told me that it was worse than any flu that she had experienced in the past. She never got a vaccination, but now wishes that she had. It's not over yet folks, even though things are getting better.

I have so far seen no reports at all of adverse effects from the Sputnik V vaccine used in over 60 nations around the world. If you have access to any such reports, it would be helpful to provide this information for others to investigate.

Argentine report on the effects of 3.4 million SPUTNIK V dose
https://bancos.salud.gob.ar/sites/default/files/2021-05/2021-05-14-informe-11.pdf

data on the side effects of the Sputnik V vaccine in San Marino
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.05.03.21256509v1

” analysis confirmed a good tolerability profile in the over 60 years age group after both doses regarding short-term solicited AEFI to Sputnik V (Gam-COVID-Vac).”

If you can specify one point. The second table (in English) is quite consistent with the table in Hungarian?

The source of the “Hungarian” table is here https://www.facebook.com/kormanyzat/posts/5439413329464676

You are not thinking about long term health damages, aren’t you? Its just “death rates”. Covid is known to cause lung and brain damage and i personally know several people in the 30 – 60 year old range who started to have memory problems after it.

These miracle vaccines are classified as experimental drugs approved for emergency use. That’s according to the US Food and Drug Administration. The FDA has been accused of excessive caution. In fact the multi-year approval process came about as thousands died from various drugs and vaccines when there were faster approvals. No one likes these long term approvals because this adds a lot to the costs of developing medicines. On the other hand, unanticipated deaths are more unpleasant. Why would a healthy person take an experimental ‘vaccine’ when the fatalities for Covid-19 are virtually zero? People over 80, and those with immune system diseases, would be rational to take an experimental cure. It is insane for younger people to take these, sick and depraved to administer these To children.

Different strains can be more fatal too, for example brasilian strain seems to be more fatal than others etc..
Even if original covid strain was not that fatal, those days are long gone.

My employer tried to force us to get the normal flu shot for the last few years, but has made a point of saying the covid vaccine is voluntary. Go figure.

Dying from corona has always been optional.

I will eventually take the covid vaccine in 3-5 years even though I already have antibodies from actually getting covid.

I’ve worked for a hospital and have vaccines for things I can’t pronounce. I am not an anti-vaxxer.

I just don’t understand the big push to force everyone to take it now. If in 5 years those who have been vaccinate are alright I’ll grab it easy peasy.

You know…. When v1.3 is out and all the major game breaking bugs are gone. Not this Early Access public beta lurking with memory leaks. It seems I can survive covid without a vaccine just fine (for now).

Why do people not want me to have the win-win-win scenario?

Don’t hate me for my superior genetics. One might even call me noble for stepping aside so the weak can get vaccinated first.

Anti-vaccine people are now complaining about the dangers of the “spike protein” created by the vaccine. First of all, the “spike proteins” created by the vaccine are not released freely throughout the body. Secondly, what do they think happens when they get a natural infection of the virus? The spike proteins from a viral infection are moving freely throughout the circulatory system and causing tremendous damage to peoples’ organs. Getting vaccinated is the far better option than toughing it out with an infection.

Covid-19 has mutated so much in 18 months that proven treatments are often failing, says head of Moscow’s top virus hospital

https://www.rt.com/russia/526313-covid-mutated-virus-treatment/

Is it the Indian variant? Or a new Russian variant? It seems a lot deadlier than last years.

“and dying because you are too lazy, paranoid, and/or have had your brain destroyed by conspiracy theories to get vaccinated.”

I think it’s the other way around, the author has absorbed too much pro-vax paranoia. I ask him, where are the millions of people dying on the street that we have been told there would be by the experts at WHO and their henchmen in various western countries? Why is it that the normal influenza rates been totally ignored by the governments and media in the past two winter seasons? I’ll tell him why, all the “normal” respiratory disease statistics have been lumped together to increase the covid statistics. Perhaps the author is a bit too young to have become immune to the BS that the former Soviet government put out and see the same BS being put forth by the various western governments about covid.

This being a lab made virus is getting more lethal instead of less with time.

I also had covid last October and for me it was a very mild flu,everyone else in my company who had it last year(approximately 50) also recovered with no serious complications.I post recovery was firmly in the ‘this is all just a hype/How could they shut down the country for this’ camp.

I actually vacationed in Goa early this year.

But this second wave due to this new variant was lethal.There are 5 people I know who are otherwise fit and in their 30s (one frequently ran half marathons) who died within days of being diagnosed with Covid.The ones who got inoculated with the AstraZeneca vaccine all survived with mild symptoms including those above 60 and with serious comormidities like Asthma.

I used to be dismissive of vaccines too and was in no particular hurry to get inoculated but in light of the overwhelming evidence of its utility have taken a shot of AstraZeneca..

Why is this thread filled with antivaxxers?

“Ahm jus’ gonna listen to muh body.” Like that’s going to tell you everything (or even anything) you need to know, lol.

Maybe 90% of people in Russia are the smart ones. They may not have high IQ’s but have a higher Biological.

I wonder how much of Russian anti-vaxx sentiment comes from memories of the Soviet medical system, which, for some reason, was similarly intrusive and tyrannical as the US system is today.

This is a pretty useless table. The Pfizer and the Moderna vaccines were initially reserved for the elderly with chronic illnesses. Younger people with comorbidities were usually given the AstraZeneca vaccine. The Sinopharm was given to healthy old people and to younger people. The Sputnik vaccine was given mostly to fit young people. The cause of death is also unclear, it appears that it includes deaths from other causes.

It’s even worse than that, because the Pfizer vaccine was started to be distributed early in January (or late December), the Sputnik only in February and mostly March and later. So simply those with the Sputnik had less time to get infected and die.

But it perhaps does show something: the Sputnik V is probably not a poison.

You do not want to get my point. Karlin’s article is a blatant manipulation reflected in its title: Dying from Corona in Russia Has Long Been “Optional”. Russia does not have enough vaccines to cover those who need it. For this reason Kremlin does not promote vaccination as it should so it creates a false image of oversupply and instead Kremlin prays that more people become anti-vaxxers. Then people like Karlin can write that everything is hunky-dory while blaming stupidity of people who do not want to get vaccinated. If those who need it tried to get it most of them would be left empty handed. Dying is not optional in Russia.

I admit that this lie is very cleverly constructed. Kremlin is very good at PR as far as their own population goes. People like Karlin dish it out and people like you eat it up. But however you disguise it and wrap it up a lie is a lie. In USSR they lied as well but at least when it came to vaccinations they did not tacitly promote obscurantist anti-vaxxer positions to deceive people that there is plenty of vaccines. This is very cynical and clever and I can see that this kind of lies is exactly what Karlin likes. Bu there is a price for it: you will end up having more misinformed idiots in your country who hopefully in the end will see through the lies and then will hang Karlin by his balls.

The same people who were making a big stink about the distinction between dying-with and dying-of virus see all the deaths that happens after vaccinations as belonging to the dying-of category.

It does appear likely that if everyone in Russia chose to get the vaccine there would be a shortage, but not enough are trying to get it so there is no problem for anyone who wants to get it, to get it.

Karlin has been promoting the vaccine and encouraging people to get vaccinated from the beginning and posted about taking it himself. He has not been cynically discouraging people from getting vaccinated. How has he actually lied in a way that would promote anti-vaxxing in Russia or elsewhere?

That’s quite fair enough, but as the concept of “priced in” suggests, valuations don’t always neatly track profitability, so valuations alone don’t answer the question of how profitable the vaccines have been for pharmaceutical companies. In any case, the vaccines are far from their sole sources of profit, so it’s theoretically perfectly possible to making a killing on vaccines but have other product lines experiencing poor sales at the same time.

long catch up to 2019 economic in the EU or UK)

That is not true. UK GDP grows 2,7% in the last reported month (April) and lockdown is not ended, and this is despite the negative impact of Brexit. So in April it was 3,7% below the pre-pandemic level.

It’s likely that pre-pandemic UK GDP will be re-attained this summer, when lockdown will be lifted fully. It’s possible it will be even by the end of July. https://www.irishtimes.com/business/economy/uk-economy-gathered-momentum-in-april-as-gdp-rose-2-3-1.4590495

So the lockdowns simply temporarily and often tautologically impact GDP, with recovery to pre-pandemic level seen to be co-eval with full lifting of lockdowns.

more debt compared to before pandemic trajectories.

Sure, the financial position of governments is significantly eroded compared to the non-pandemic scenario. But what is the raison d’être of a government to prioritize “strong financial position” during good times, if not for allowing it to have more space to maneuver during “bad times” events like pandemics.

This is the kind of event (the last serious pandemic was in 1919) for which a government should have prepared.

drop in TFR,

If there will indeed be any drop caused by the lockdown (which is not clear at all), then it won’t effect actual fertility rates. TFR fluctuates up and down due to its design, while the real fertility rate is much less effected, and it is only the real fertility (not TFR) that will have an impact on future population size.

no instant economic boom

There is a crazt boom at the moment in areas like hi-tech investments. It’s not seeming very rational, but there is certainly an boom, and something like “crazy money”.

For example, startups in Israel already raised $10,5 billion in 5 months this year. This is equivalent of all last year (and already last year was a record at half the speed). https://www.calcalistech.com/ctech/articles/0,7340,L-3909578,00.html

Similar situations in India (https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/tech/startups/indian-startups-raised-7-8-billion-in-first-four-months-of-2021/articleshow/82889825.cms), China, UK (https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/dec/29/uk-tech-firms-record-15bn-venture-capital-funding-unicorns-2020), etc.

Now a money question: can you clearly state whether you are in favour of vaccinating the young, or children? We can all agree on the elderly, but how about everyone else?

A lot of countries are setting the age of vaccination at 12.
https://www.wionews.com/world/covid-19-countries-that-are-vaccinating-children-against-deadly-virus-389192

During the first wave of the pandemic in England, there were eight deaths in SARS-CoV-2 positive children, including four that were attributed to COVID-19, of which three were in children aged 10–15 years with severe underlying neurodisabilities.

https://adc.bmj.com/content/early/2021/01/04/archdischild-2020-321225
Only 1 healthy child died of COVID in the UK during the first wave which I guess killed about 57k people.

Well I go past carparks of pharma companies, and their employees are buying nice cars. It seems like half of some of their employees are buying a Tesla this year.

Similarly there can be viewed the billion dollar kinds of (a little sinister) offices they are building for their employees.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/imageserver/image/%2Fmethode%2Ftimes%2Fprod%2Fweb%2Fbin%2F1438d2e6-893a-11e9-abe3-2791ad0a81dd.jpg?crop=1279%2C720%2C0%2C67&resize=1180

Which is to say, they are not exactly living like Saint Francis of Assisi.

–

But I talking some times ago, to a chief executive of a multinational pharmaceutical corporation, and did not receive an intuition or “spidey sense”, that I was in front of an evil genius that had organized the coronavirus pandemic. He seems like a nice man, and he even goes to work by train. But, who knows, perhaps their ability to seem normal to naive outsiders like myselfe, is just another indication of the pharmaceutical workers’ dark Machiavellian talents.

These videos of people sticking things to themselves are rubbish. I haven’t had a vaccine, nor will I, but if I slap my iPhone onto the upper half of my pectoral where there’s no hair, it sticks there.

I haven’t tried anything else because the point is already proven. It’s a combination of friction and suction.

Note that you don’t see anyone with stuff hanging off their elbows which would be a convincing demonstration of true magnetism.

Any ‘doctor’ who extrapolates anything from this without first noting that it’s a party trick is not worth listening to.

Hungary just like Czechia and Poland had any prospects of getting vaccines

Nonetheless a more strict/serious lockdown, if even only in the beginning of this year, would have saved thousands of lives in Hungary, and allowed an earlier return to normal life, than what has happened.

And Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia and Poland, are all relatively successful in managing the pandemic, compared to what happened in Russia.

And this continues now. For example, on the vaccination rollout:

Russia is severely undercounted.

Yes transparency of medical statistics provided during the pandemic, has been more like I would have expected in a third world country (which is an insult to many third world countries, that have been more transparent, despite less resources).

Israel, Hungary and Russia deaths/million are 689

Israel was totally incompetent in its delayed lockdown in the beginning of this year, resulting in thousands of additional deaths (disproportionately many of these final wave deaths were in the Arab Israeli population, which was slower to be vaccinated, reflecting low state capacity in areas). This was while authorities demonstrated high state capacity with the vaccination rollout, but the coalition government has delayed the final lockdown. The lockdown imposed in Israel in January was also far weaker than previous (strict and successful) lockdowns. It seemed that the vaccine rollout was providing false confidence and reducing pressure for the more effective lockdown that had been seen in Israel earlier in the pandemic.

In Hungary, there seemed to be something similar, and the most deadly peaks of the pandemic, arrived after their politicians were self-clapping about their efficient vaccine rollout.

intentional decision of feigning ineptitude, which in their cases did not take much effort,

In Russia, where the disasters has been more than in Visegrad – in the beginning the response had seemed not bad by European average.

Attempts to prevent the virus entering Russia had failed. As we were following on this blog. Re-reading our old posts, we were still trying to be optimistic in March 2020. https://www.unz.com/akarlin/russian-corona/#comment-3769819

In end of April 2020, in Russia, the authorities follow responsible policies, to impose lockdown, and reduce the first wave of the virus (which has likely saved thousands of lives), pushing it into summer when spaces become ventilated.

However, preparation for disaster begins at this time, because of the negative effect on the government’s approval rating. Responsible policies of the government (lockdown) appeared to result in the lowest presidential approval rating of all time.

And from there, the disaster was prepared. When the inevitable autumn wave arrives, the government chose a more laissez-faire and liberal response, than was ever really followed in Sweden. In the excess deaths indicator, it seems there are by now more than half a million lives lost.

TFR fluctuates up and down due to its design, while the real fertility rate is much less effected, and it is only the real fertility (not TFR) that will have an impact on future population size.

It “fluctuates” [not in the way people usually think when they hear that word] in response to changes in real fertility. It is the sum of age-specific fertility rates, so if real fertility increases, how could this not show up in the TFR?

What evidence do you have of long term damages from the virus? Many well credentialed scientists have written about potential long term harm from the gene therapy experiment you guys are pushing. Why do you ignore them and instead trust those who have a financial interest in pushing the shots? I’ll stick with the control group, you go with the experimental medication, in 1 or 3 years we should know who was right.

This is a pretty useless table.

Of course, such data can not be used to compare vaccines, I understand this very well. But these data (if they are correct) are suitable for refuting urban legends (“at my work, 12 people were vaccinated, 6 of them are now on a ventilator in the hospital, two have already died from coronavirus”)

There used to be societies that sacrificed children. It was done because children were helpless not because gods preferred it.

The push to vaccinate children is the same: vaccinate children who are at zero risk from corona to theoretically prolong the lives of a few elderly by a few years. That’s he deal with the devil – it brings us back to the animal world.

We live in a gerontocracy, it is not biologically sustainable. The people with no interest in offspring, with no families, are at the forefront of fanatically pushing vaccinating everyone. I suspect AK and his merry band of vax-pushers are not family people – it doesn’t matter to them, sacrifice the young, whatever, just keep elderly and hypochondriacs comfortable.

This is conservative? How?

If the Gulf War taught me anything is bioweapon vaccines cause more problems than they solve. The so called “Gulf War syndrome”.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1569620/

Assuming it was a bioweapon…. even so.

A virus usually doesn’t evolve unless outside pressures/forces are forcing it to do so. This process happens over a long period of time.

One might even argue these rushed vaccines are what is strengthening the virus to adapt to more lethal forms. As they seem to be the only strong outside force.

Just saying…

And I’m no pinnacle of health either. I’ve abused my body in a lot of ways.

Guess we’ll find out in 5 years. By then Cyberpunk 2077 should have its multiplayer feature released and be on patch 3.79.1563f…

So how do you explain the fact that vaccination rate in Russia is steady, so the function of vaccinated vs. time remains linear?

Why is it that in one week of April the same number of people got vaccinated as in one week of June? The vaccination in Russia is controlled by vaccine supply not by vaccine demand. The alleged phenomenon of waning public interest in vaccination that Kremlin and Karlin are trying to make us believe in would imply reaching a point where the curve bend with negative 2nd derivative. In the US the curve bending began in mid April when the number of vaccinated was 40%. This is when the curve began to be controlled by the demand.

So how is it done that week after week for last 8 weeks the same number of people get vaccinated each week? Why people who got vaccinate in June did not get vaccinated in April? Why did they wait 8 weeks? What made them suddenly get up in June and go to get vaccinated? It is simple: there is a hidden rationing of vaccine while Karlin tries to make us believe that everybody can just walk in. Few can but most people who want to get vaccinated must wait for their turn through some signing up process just like it is being done in other countries where in order not to overwhelm the system people of special groups and ages were permitted to sign up for vaccination and the vaccination date is assigned to them.

It is really sad that Karlin is willing to libel his compatriots with accusation of obscurantism and anti-vaxxers idiocies in order to hide the fact that there is vaccine shortage in Russia, that Russia has no production capacity to satisfy the demand. A proud nationalist who for the sake of Kremlin arse covering PR is willing to paint 90% of his compatriots as idiots, the 90% who did not get vaccinated. They did not because they could not. Dying still is not optional in Russia!

The vaccine is being rationed by signing up process. The number of vaccinated vs. time curve is still controlled by supply not demand. Dying still is not optional in Russia. See my comment #119 to AP.

There is some evidence. Even anecdotal evidence is evidence (“my friends and acquaintances who got ill� is certainly a sample, even if not necessarily a very representative sample, but why exclude that piece of evidence when you don’t have quality statistics?), and certainly hospitals seem to see the exact same anecdotes:

Those most recently in hospital in Bolton with Covid-19 coronavirus were “a lot younger� than in previous waves of the pandemic, an NHS boss has said.

https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/uk-news/delta-covid-variant-hotspot-seeing-20748024

Of course there is one confounding factor that now a lot of people are vaccinated, especially among the elderly, so maybe it just reflects this, but I would say that with the initial Wuhan numbers saying that no one in his twenties was killed, it just has to be more virulent. At least it just seems so in the absence of high quality statistical data.

As long as there’s nothing better you have to use anecdotal evidence, unless you have compelling reasons not to.

And Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia and Poland, are all relatively successful in managing the pandemic, compared to what happened in Russia.

They are all very bad. None of them is successful in any way. In case of Czechia, Slovakia and Poland the question is why did they abandon their approach in the second wave that was really working in the first wave? Was it just indolence and stupid premature celebration that the pandemic was gone or a quiet, calculated and cynical decision to go the Swedish way and do the old age genocide?

Russia is not transparent enough for us to know what took place.

So how do you explain the fact that vaccination rate in Russia is steady, so the function of vaccinated vs. time remains linear?….The vaccination in Russia is controlled by vaccine supply

“The vaccination in Russia is controlled by vaccine supply” – this hypothesis is complete nonsense as it contradicts empirical observations. Come to Russia and go to the shopping center to see how the vaccination points work (alternatively, call these vaccination points and find out what you need to get vaccinated). If you do not want to do this, it is better to stop posting conspiracy theories here

In addition, the rate of vaccination changes-here is a graph of the average number of vaccinated per week

https://gogov.ru/articles/covid-v-stats

Especially when only very few Russians are reading Karlin, and those are not anti-vaxxers at all, because this is an English blog.

I think one big failure was Putin not getting the vaccine for a long time, and then not in front of cameras.

It could have a very mundane reason, like Putin having an irrational fear of needless. I know an otherwise fit guy who doesn’t seem very cowardly or anything, but he cannot stand blood or needles, and turns pale whenever he sees something like that. (Though I’m pretty sure that such irrational fears could be treated, it might be embarrassing for Putin, and most people having it just treat it as a kind of personality quirk.)

I think one big failure was Putin not getting the vaccine for a long time, and then not in front of cameras.

This is undoubtedly a great failure personally for Putin, but it has had a negligible effect on the rate of vaccination

And for example in Brazil thousands of children have died to covid, which was not the case in first wave and still is not the case in most countries where brazilian strain is not dominant.
So it certainly seems like that brazilian strain is more fatal.
British strain seems not to be much fatal or south-african strain. Dont know yet if indian strain is more fatal, it might be too..

It could of course be an unsuccessful money making scheme.

The choice is to either get the vaccine or the virus. You cannot avoid the virus unless you get vaccinated. Well unless everyone else gets vaccinated, and then you can benefit from the herd immunity.

I have also noticed that those opposed to the vaccines usually oppose other measures like masks. So what is your proposal to avoid getting infected with the virus? Because obviously you don’t think it’s the vaccine.

Oh what a tangled web we weave
When first we practice to deceive

There are lies and there is a subtle conspiracy. Karlin spreads Dmitry Peskov lies

Russia lags behind others in its COVID-19 vaccination drive (May 3, 2021)
https://apnews.com/article/russia-coronavirus-world-news-europe-health-3d166261cb9f80964c8ce1e1ef9a4525
On April 28, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said there are enough vaccines available in Russia, adding that demand was the defining factor in the country’s vaccination rate.

and you seem to believe them.

Pretty much all vaccines that were released for the internal market after passing the quality control have been used. The demand is obviously much higher. The responsible and dutiful citizens are waiting for appointments which they will get once more vaccine is available. The vaccination rate is around 10% so far because there was no vaccines for more. But once more vaccines are made available the vaccination rate will increase. You will see in July that vaccination rate will reach 20% or higher.

Waiting lists for the shot remain long in places. In the Sverdlovsk region, the fifth most-populous in Russia, 178,000 people were on a wait list by mid-April, regional Deputy Health Minister Yekaterina Yutyaeva told AP.

The conspiracy part is that Kremlin purposefully downplayed vaccination urgency to create a perception of vaccine abundance. Vaccine abundance is artificial.

I don’t want to believe that Kremlin was behind social media anti-vaxxing campaign to reduce the demand, though everything is possible, but certainly Kremlin benefited from growing anti-vaxxing sentiments. Also the bad mouthing Western vaccines and their side effects in Russian media could have contribute to mistrust:

Rumors about the alleged dangers of vaccines actually surged on social media in December, when Russia began administering the shots, and have continued steadily since then, said social anthropologist Alexandra Arkhipova.

Kremlin did not start full speed vaccination campaign in media until late March:

A proper media campaign promoting vaccinations didn’t begin on state TV until late March, observers and news reports note. Videos on the Channel 1 national network featured celebrities and other public figures talking about their experience but didn’t show them getting injected. President Vladimir Putin said he received the shot about the same time, but not on camera.

And then there are mixed messages. Kremlin actions made people think that the pandemics is over:

Dragan, the data analyst, says one possible explanation for the reluctance is the narrative from authorities that they have tamed the outbreak, even if that assessment might be premature.

With most virus restrictions lifted and government officials praising the Kremlin’s pandemic response, few have motivation to get the shot, he said, citing an attitude of, “If the outbreak is over, why would I get vaccinated?�

Government statistics say infections have stayed at about 8,000-9,000 per day nationwide, with 300-400 deaths recorded daily. But new cases have been steadily increasing in Moscow in the past month, exceeding 3,000 last week for the first time since January.

Anyway, 30% and probably more people in Russia are willing to get vaccinated and with some nudging more will. But for this to happen vaccines must be made available first. The availability is limited by the production capacity in Russia. Not all batches pass the quality control. Possibly more vaccines will come from India which was licensed to produce Sputnik V.

My brother works for a multinational with a huge office in India. Multiple people in their thirties have died there, though I don’t know how healthy (or not) they were.

But, who knows, perhaps their ability to seem normal to naive outsiders like myselfe, is just another indication of the pharmaceutical workers’ dark Machiavellian talents.

Executives usually do know how to talk to people and befriend them.

Yes, that’s correct.

But there are many possible points here. Like Big Pharma started the pandemic. (Highly unlikely.) Big Pharma used a pandemic started by others to make profits. (Well, that’s what pharmaceutical companies are supposed to do.) The pandemic is false but is exaggerated by Big Pharma. (Is Big Pharma powerful enough for this?) There’s a conspiracy of many big firms including Big Pharma (and also other, more powerful industries like Big Tech) to exaggerate the pandemic. (Again, at least there should be competing interests, especially in other countries.) The vaccines don’t work. (None of them? Only some of them?)

Probably dozens of such sentences could be written, many of them not compatible with the others, and some interlinked.

So it’s a very general statement to say that it could be a failed money making scheme. Pharma CEOs could be reptilians (provided those even exist), but is there any evidence for that? They could also be wizards (but there’s no evidence wizards even exist). Or angels of God. (Provided those even exist.) Is there a reason to entertain the theory that it’s a failed money making scheme? Are there more reasons than to think that pharma CEOs are reptilians?

I think a more specific hypothesis could be discussed better.

But yes, they are not necessarily very good people (executives often have some slight psychopathic tendencies), and probably impressions got during a social conversation can be highly misleading about any CEO. Big Pharma might also be an industry which is perhaps worse, on average, than the rest. Though it’s interesting that AFAIK the overlap between the painkiller racket and the vaccine peddlers is not that large.

Is there a reason to entertain the theory that it’s a failed money making scheme? Are there more reasons than to think that pharma CEOs are reptilians?

Please note it was our esteemed host who dismissed the possibility that this was a money making scheme because it didn’t seem to make money. But failure of money making does not imply money making was never intended. In addition, we don’t know what the fiscal outcome will be.

I’ll leave your long list of perhapses for another time, perhaps, perhaps, perhaps even another era.

As to reptilians, well …

Not enough comments but this is a hard agree.

If you look just at official RF coronastats, dying rate is simply relentless slow motion trainwreck over there, even if not super high and mainly flatlined. But it is constant and neverending so far.

The vaccination rate is around 10% so far because there was no vaccines for more.

I’m sorry, but this is completely ridiculous. 10% is vaccination rate with two doses of the vaccine. If the reason was a lack of vaccine – it was possible to vaccinate only the first dose (which is easier to produce). According to Argentine data https://www.diariocontexto.com.ar/2021/06/02/estudio-revelo-que-la-sputnik-v-tiene-una-efectividad-con-una-sola-dosis-de-786/ , the first dose of Sputnik had an efficiency of 76% among the elderly-and
this is a very good efficiency.

In addition many millions of doses of the vaccine are sold abroad

Is there any data available (no matter independent or by designers/makers themselves) about Sputnik’s efficacy against variants?

140-odd references – did I miss the reference to the Danish study or is it not there? That’s my yardstick for a mask review: you can argue source control if you want (lol) and you can even argue masks protect the wearer, but you at least need to account for the Danish study somehow. If you just ignore it, you deserve to be ignored in turn.

What discussion?

I get this impression that you are no longer sincere. You know you have no arguments left so you opted for making few random noises.

Whatever was slated for internal use in Russia for this period by Kremlin decisions has been fully utilized. And more will be utilized as more supplies will be coming. I predict that by the end of July 20% prevalence will be reached providing that Kremlin slates at least 5o% of vaccine production for the domestic use.

Kremlin decided to sell almost 50% of its production to other countries is another though related issue. It tells you about Kremlin priorities that Kremlin prefers doing international PR and making few bucks over helping Russians by providing more vaccines. If Kremlin was more concerned with Russians almost 20% of Russians would have been vaccinated by now. And you would not need silly Karlin stories that anti-vaxxer body snatchers took over 90% of Russians.

Oh, it’s a deadly bioweapon now?

With the crucial difference being that deaths with vaccine need to be investigated, hence are all potentially deaths of vaccine; whereas with deaths with and from the virus, we already have a large dataset from which to draw conclusions. The vaccine needs to be confirmed safe and effective before being given to everybody – first, do no harm – even if it is necessary (it isn’t)

the sovok anti-vaxx conspiracy theorists

Why those are even a thing though? I mean USSR had strict mandatory vaxing, including small children, for many diseases and all of the supposedly antivax sovoks and their children should have been vaxed too, thus being antivax should run contrary against Soviet nostalgia? Or are they somehow opposed just to modern “bad” vaxing, while old Soviet vaxing was “good”?

If clinics were calling pensioners urging them to come in for a shot, and it emerged that there were not enough shots for them, there would be a scandal. – Tell me why clinics would make appointments if they had no shots? They arrange appointments within available allotment, say minus 5%, of vaccine. That’s how vaccine is rationed in the supply driven market to maintain the appearance of abundant availability. That people who want to be vaccinated do not do walk-ins is because people, who want to be vaccinated are planners, they wait for their turn after making appointments and probably they have heard of cases of people being told that vaccine was no longer available on a given today when they did a walk-in.

“that I (of all people) are helping them with it” – I did not accuse you for anti-vaxxer propaganda. I accused you of using anti-vaxxers as an excused for Kremlin’s failure to provide more vaccines which Kremlin had but decided to export it for the PR glory and few bucks.

“…how your rage is focused against me specifically, as opposed to the sovok anti-vaxx conspiracy theorist..” – It is easer to understand and excuse stupid people than excuse lies from people with sufficient intelligence and moral capacity to know better.

“That is because you politically endorse such sentiments” – There is some rationality behind such sentiments. Only about 30 millions people were vaccinated with Russian vaccines in the world which is an order of magnitude less than for Western vaccines. And BTW, you participated in the vaccine trials. Did you get vaccine certificate or were you in placebo group?

“my own personal liquidation as a thorn in the foot of Western Supremacism” – Do not exaggerate your importance. Beside you have a great potential for being reformed in rehabilitation centers.

It didn’t make a lot of money (certainly not much if the industry had the power to shut down society or anything similar), and it was foreseeable. (Politicians wouldn’t allow that under any scenario.) I think it’s a good enough argument and it still stands.

Also it’s incompatible (or at least difficult to reconcile) with these theories, or at least most of them. “Big Pharma is powerful enough to force the planet to get vaccinated with dangerous and useless vaccines, only to make money, but it isn’t powerful enough to negotiate a high enough price to actually make some real money.�

This makes theories that vaccines are a Big Pharma money-making scheme hard to credit.

Well, they are a Big Pharma money-making scheme. They’re not free.

I think you mean that the virus is not a Big Pharma money-making scheme, and I’m happy to agree. Although I didn’t see anyone here arguing that it was.

If you had invested into Big Pharma, you would have lost money relative not just to investing in crypto or Big Tech, but even the market as a whole.

If you’d invested in Moderna or BioNTech pre-pandemic, you’d have more than doubled your money.

A couple of years ago Moderna was publicly being compared to Theranos and struggling to explain themselves to investors; in 2020, with lower standards at the FDA, suddenly mRNA managed to pass safety trials and make it to market. That’s not necessarily conspiracy, that’s just opportunism.

Last time I saw a strawman that big, Edward Woodward was locked in its chest

English version of RT is giving every day anti-vaxx, anti lockdown propaganda for some reason though.

No.

The numbers on this chart are compelling. On the other hand, I too can confirm that at least in Moscow there is no problem for anyone to get a vaccine if they want to. I also know numerous Russians (in the West) who refuse to get vaccinated. One, a physician, left her job at a (Western) hospital rather than get vaccinated. So anti-vaxx sentiment is widespread and doesn’t depend on the Russian government, it reflects attitudes that precede recent events.

You know what I detect in this post? Emotion. You must free yourself, Tolya, from your emotional investment in this subject. Yes, you called the China Virus early, and yes it did ‘crater the global economy and kill millions”, though perhaps what has happened is among the most mild scenarios that technically fulfill that broad forecast.

There’s simply no way to understand the long term properties of these vaccines, until long term studies are done. Even then, it’s easy to imagine small-effect-size harms that don’t get picked up in studies. So people are totally rational for not getting the vaccine, for a virus that isn’t especially deadly, isn’t even worse than the flu if you take your HCQ, even for healthy old people. If you’re an unhealthy oldie? Well, we all die. In any case, little is accomplished approaching the subject with such a transparent bias.

It follows the pattern. “Telling me what to do it bad. People doing it must be making money off of it.”

Due to elite retardation, the entire planet has been turned into a low trust society.

The simplest possible answer.

You cannot avoid the virus unless you get vaccinated.

Well, I seem to have avoided it for a year and a half by taking a few reasonable precautions. In that time, I’ve met exactly two people who have had the virus and experienced mild symptoms.

Your false dichotomy is “be infected or take the vaccine” where taking the vaccine is a sure way of receiving something potentially sinister directly from a lab versus a slight chance of receiving something that probably originated in a lab that has gone through numerous mutations in human hosts. I’m gambling on the latter. So far it’s been a safe bet.

Your straw man is that we “trust this artificially enhanced chimerical virus”. We don’t trust it at all, and earnestly want to know what it is, who made it, and why. And we’re loath to take the ‘cure’ for it before we know the cause of it.

Also there’s no way of knowing yet what the vaccine does. I for one will wait and see. I don’t know anyone who has died from Covid, but I know one person who has suffered horribly from the vaccine. That’s the dataset that informs my decision.

Maybe the Kremlin lying about Corona mortality convinced many Russians that the Kremlin lies about sputnik vaccine danger too

True, Big Pharma companies have vested interests.
However, it’s not true that SARS-CoV-2 has not been proven to exist(Covid 19 is the disease or syndrome , the infectious agent is SARS-CoV-2).
If you meant SARS-CoV-2 failed to fulfill traditional Koch’s postulates, consider this article from Reuters:-
https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-koch-idUSL2N2L23F1

Some articles :-
1.) Electromicrograph of SARS-CoV-2 grown on Vero cells.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-020-73162-5

2.) Finding of coronavirus virions on pathological samples.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41379-021-00793-y

We can indeed argue about the lethality of this virus , on whether this pandemic is as catastrophic as mainstream media bleats continuously or it’s just like seasonal influenza(personally I think Covid 19 is slightly more lethal than seasonal influenza but not at the level of mass hysteria the likes of CNN , BBC , Al Jazeera bla bla). I would also mention that Covid 19 lethality is probably much reduced due to modern medicine/healthcare + public health measures. It might have been more lethal, say if the pandemic occured in the 19th century. However, the virus and the disease itself is real. As I have commented before sometime ago in another thread , if the next pandemic comes with the lethality of Nipahvirus and the infectiousness and asymptomatic carrier state like SARS-CoV-2, this pandemic will be nothing compared to the massive mortality that such a hypothetical virus will cause.

Some of the more prevalent reasons that I hear regarding anti-vaxing is related to some sort of fear of ingesting pathogens that will appear later in life and damage the healthy functioning of bodily processes. I probably could use language that more accurately reflects their fears, but I think you know what I’m writing about here. Could you better explain what these fears center around, and do you give them much credence?

I think you raise valid points. My position is – I am neither an anti-vaxxer nor a pro-vaxxer. There should be some rationality in the vaccination drive. The main issues with Covid-19 are these :-
1. “High risk groups” develop severe disease with significant morbidity and mortality.
2. The tendency for healthcare to be overwhelmed with moderate to severe Covid-19 patients which would compromise healthcare for both Covid and non Covid patients.
So, it makes sense for high risk groups be recommended to receive Covid vaccines. And I think the “high risk groups” should be defined : elderly(more than 60 yo?), those with certain medical co-morbidities(eg cardiovascular disease, pulmonary conditions, cancer), healthcare workers(potential exposure to massive doses of the virus if they care for undiagnosed Covid patients )?

So far, toddlers and the young don’t seem to get severe disease(although some pulmonologist friends of mine have anecdotally mentioned more severe and fatal cases of Covid in the young in my country of late) – so probably not really recommended for massive Covid vaccination.

Ultimately, the public should be given basic information regarding the risks and benefits of all the different types of vaccines , information about risk groups and estimated risk of severe disease/mortality : then let each individual decide for themselves. I deplore the scaremongering tactics of politicians and mainstream media.

If we can get just the high risk groups to vaccinate, I think the mortality will reduce, the healthcare will not be overwhelmed with severe Covid patients(and thus improve the survival of these patients) and the world might actually be back to almost a pre-covid normalcy. And at the same time, scientists should not just rely on Covid vaccines -research on understanding the pathophysiology of the disease should continue : developing anti virals and anti cytokine storm agents should be the aim.

I seem to have avoided it for a year and a half by taking a few reasonable precautions

Well so far I haven’t been infected either, but my plan is to live longer than one and a half years (or even decades), and I don’t want to continue doing all precautions (including things like never or extremely rarely dining out), certainly not indefinitely.

I’ve met exactly two people who have had the virus and experienced mild symptoms.

Well this means that you are either a hermit or in some weird place like New Zealand or Taiwan. Neither is applicable to me, and this also makes your achievement of not getting infected that much less impressive. For the rest of us, the only realistic long term way of not getting infected is getting vaccinated.

Just come back from party where were few Russian imigrants. Non of them would like to get vaccinated. Not even Pfizer. Reason 1001 why you need to control media. Nobody even debate them. Like ok whatever.

The conspiracy I hear most is that the vaccines produce a spike protein, which is toxic to most cells. The second part is true, but the first is not entirely so.

“Now we get to a key difference: when a cell gets the effect of an mRNA nanoparticle or an adenovirus vector, it of course starts to express the Spike protein. But instead of that being assembled into more infectious viral particles, as would happen in a real coronavirus infection, this protein gets moved up to the surface of the cell, where it stays. That’s where it’s presented to the immune system, as an abnormal intruding protein on a cell surface. The Spike protein is not released to wander freely through the bloodstream by itself, because it has a transmembrane anchor region that (as the name implies) leaves it stuck. That’s how it sits in the virus itself, and it does the same in human cells. See the discussion in this paper on the development of the Moderna vaccine, and the same applies to all the mRNA and vector vaccines that produce the Spike. You certainly don’t have the real-infection situation of Spike-covered viruses washing along everywhere through the circulation. The Spike protein produced by vaccination is not released in a way that it gets to encounter the ACE2 proteins on the surface of other human cells at all: it’s sitting on the surface of muscle and lymphatic cells up in your shoulder, not wandering through your lungs causing trouble.”

https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2021/05/04/spike-protein-behavior

If you don’t get the vaccine, then you will have virus particles with the spike protein attacking any cell they can get a hold of. So vaccine >>>> natural infection.

Taiwan is losing control over the virus. This may be because of the Indian variant, or it may be because they are stuck in the dark ages of testing. (It takes about 9 days to get the results of your test back.) Also, they can only get vaccines from mainland China, which is probably not going to send any.

Do you really believe that government mandates are never motivated in part by financial gain for the government‘s officials, donors, and elites? Your comments reflect intelligence and not undue naivete, so I would think we are generally on the same page here.

As for helmets, one needs to buy a helmet once as an adult, but one needs to get these vaccines many times: one or two shots to start, depending on the vaccine, then booster shots periodically perhaps annually. One doesn‘t keep buying new seat belts for the same vehicle every year or two either. The profit potential per person is far higher with mandatory vaccines than mandatory helmets and seat belts.

The TOTAL profit to be made from vaccine mandates is also vastly higher than the profit to be made from seat belt mandates for another reason: we don‘t have to buy another car / set of seat belts for every member of the family, merely 1-2 vehicles typically per household. But they are trying to force the vaccines on every person in the family, soon perhaps down to toddlers and little kids. (Example: our household has only one vehicle but more than half a dozen people).

Also, a seat belt or helmet properly used can never harm the user, whereas even the best vaccines unavoidably harm some of their users. Wearing a seat belt or helmet can only protect the wearer. Requiring people to wear seat belts and helmets cannot do damage to their bodies or risk their lives, organ function, or fertility.

Another distinction: governments, the vaccine manufacturers, and other corporations participating in the pandemic fear-blitz feel the need to employ a unique level of threatening, shaming, coercing, and bribing people into taking the vaccines when tens of millions of Americans find it unnecessary to get jabbed with these vaccines because

(1) they reasonably conclude that the virus‘s lethality has been generally exaggerated (including through the attribution of accident, cancer, and other deaths to COVID-19, and through the use of a PCR test that is acknowledged to generate so many false positives that it is unreliable);

And/or (2) they reasonably conclude that even the dishonest inflated COVID-19 death stats show very low risk of death or permanent damage for people in their particular age group and health condition, or

(3) they think that the virus is somewhat more contagious and/or more lethal than most recent viruses, but still don‘t want to risk them and especially their children getting experimental vaccines. Such people may be willing to get a supposed covid-19 vaccine once it has gone through full trials and we have had more time to observe adverse events and figure out which are likely caused by the vaccine. Or they may be willing to get a covid-19 vaccine based on a more well-established mechanism of action.

We use our seat belts all the time, and we have our kids wear helmets when biking or scootering. Why? Because we have rationally determined, for our own family, that seat belts and helmets offer life- and brain-saving benefits with zero possibility of harm or injury from wearing them. It’s a no-brainer. But we wouldn’t presume to threaten some other American with a fine, let alone jail time, because they choose not to wear a helmet or seat belt. (However, the law should allow motor-vehicle and personal-liability insurers to reduce payment if they can show that the insured’s injuries were more serious/costly than they likely would have been if they had worn a helmet or seat belt.)

We don‘t wear helmets because we‘re required to and wouldn’t if that were the only „reason“ — just as we rarely wore masks where they were purportedly „required“ without legislation (through „executive orders“ of governors acting as dictators, and „orders“ of domineering health „authorities“ who have gotten too big for their britches) and with conflicting medical evidence about their efficacy and potential adverse effects.

In short, AP, we see major material distinctions between these vaccines and seat belts and helmets, both in the weighing of likely protection versus plausible potential harm to our family, and in the total and per capita profits available to the manufacturers.

** So yes, the manufacturer of any good or service always has a strong financial incentive to push government to force us to buy that good or service. The financial incentive applies when the product is a seat belt or helmet, which we find always worth using and don’t need to be forced or shamed to use. But the incentive also applies — and much more strongly — for vaccines approved under emergency authorization for a badly exaggerated virus.

Our objection is not that manufacturers would make money per se, but that they would make vast profits by selling products whose use is mandated based on lies, exaggeration, bullying, social pressure, and suppression of evidence and competing assessments.

As for such a competing assessment of the virus by medical doctors and epidemiologists, please see Swiss Policy Project (www.swprs.org).

Well I didn’t write it all that seriously, but obviously it reinforces my point.

They often are.

Unfortunately Russia looks increasingly like a second world repeat of what happened in India this April.

A government/population which is lulled into complacency due to a relatively mild first wave and then a disastrous second wave.

On top of that very recklessly Russia has not temporarily stopped tourists from India like most countries(in fact there is now some sort of a visa on arrival travel arrangement for tour groups) so there are presently a record number of Indian tourists in Russia now(Mostly Moscow and Spb) since it is pretty much the only option for a foreign vacation.

I hope the Russians have enough oxygen supplies preferably oxygen generating plants at hospitals as this wave killed primarily due to a virtually overnight 500% increase in medical oxygen demand and the resulting inability of the supply infrastructure to cope.

AK, we all have our weaknesses of personality and argument style, you and me included. You are resorting again to this arrogant, illogical trope: nobody can disagree with your medical expertise unless they’re “the type of person� who is unintelligent, ignorant, and can’t understand the terms used.

As for the carelessly used general slur “anti-vaxxers�, let’s be more analytically precise:

(1) the fact that someone opposes an EXPERIMENTAL-vaccine mandate doesn’t tell us whether they would oppose a mandate to take a non-experimental vaccine after longer, more rigorous trials and won normal rather than emergency authorization (my wife and I wouldn’t get non-experimental vax for this virus either, but it’s a separate issue and some people would);

(2) the fact that someone opposes ANY covid-19 vaccine mandate (whether the vaccine has emergency experimental authorization or approval after full trials) doesn’t tell us how they assess the likely-risk/benefit ratio. People who place a relatively higher value on individual freedom of choice and liberty will more often oppose forcing other people to get these vaccines but may take it themselves (my sister and her husband are such people).

(3) the fact that someone refuses to take any COVID-19 vaccine, experimental or not, doesn’t tell us what they think about other vaccines, or about the justice and prudence of mandating those other vaccines. You’d probably slur me and my wife and most of my family and friends as “anti-vaxxers.� But our circle of folks, like the general population, is otherwise pro-vaccine (even pro-vaccine-mandate) for many maladies — they split whether to mandate, and whether to take, the COVID-19 vaccines.

We make up our minds anew in each case, as new viral threats arise and vaccines are developed in response — based on evidence and advice from doctors and epidemiologists, online and among our acquaintances. We consult your columns and some of the cited sources, too. We do this case-by-case analysis when deciding whether we and our children will get a new vaccine. We also do this analysis when deciding whether to support or oppose forcing other people to get that new vaccine.

To conclude on a point similar to one made previously: some people with children are understandably not well disposed towards people who have no children but have plenty of opinions about what OUR children should be forced to do, where they should not be allowed to go, whom they should not be allowed to meet, where they should be allowed to stand, whether they should be allowed to play team sports, sing in church, play with other kids, hug their grandparents, even SEE their grandparents in person before they die, and so much more. It’s easy for someone who has no experience raising children to be a know-it-all about what those children need, to impair our kids’ education, socialization, health, and well-being and lecture us not to be selfish or stupid.

People whose family businesses have been impaired or destroyed, whose life savings are gone, who face eviction or foreclosure once the repeated moratoria are allowed to lapse in the US, also don’t take kindly to someone who doesn’t own such a business and hasn’t suffered such devastating losses thanks to the lockdowns you favor. It’s all too easy for someone like you to tell them, “suck it up, tough luck, don’t be ‘selfish’ and ‘ignorant’ (‘cause hey, I’ve still got mine).�

It’s good to see so many allegedly stupid and ignorant people trying to live free and breathe free in Russia. As for Russians reflexively distrusting whatever the government says, that shouldn’t be hard to fathom. Same for Americans who have come to presumptively distrust and disbelieve our rulers.

In short, AK, you can make your points well — you do on other topics — without insulting everyone who disagrees with you.

Nor do you need to throw around highly imprecise and often misleading slurs like “anti-vaxxers.� (Of the many people we know who refuse to get a covid-19 vaccine for themselves and their children, not a single one is opposed to all vaccination. Every one of them was glad to get their kids the vaccines for polio, rubella, etc. I was, too, given that my great-grandmother suffered from polio and was confined to a wheelchair for the 90-plus years of her life as a result, not uncommon back then.)

Come on, man, you offer such a unique perspective and sense of humor, with varied interests, great writing in English — why ruin it by needlessly insulting people who disagree with you?

Now get away from the screen, go outside into the sunlight and air, and take off that damn face-muffler. That’s what we’re gonna do right now. And without a mask, you can start smiling at the devushkas again. You’ll be more relaxed and can get busy repopulating Rodina 😉 Even your pandemic detractors like me are rooting for that. And the next time “the authorities� order a lockdown, for reasons real or exaggerated, you’ll see how it affects your own children. You might still suport that lockdown too, but you’ll have a different perspective and more relevant experience, and you might (I hope) assess the risks/benefits of lockdown differently.

God bless you, AK, our countries, and everyone sincerely trying to ascertain the right and fair answers are to these questions.

If your odds of surviving corona are as low as you say, accept my sympathies. For 90% of people the odds are better than a test MRNA vaccine that requires an annual booster shot.

I know few people who had it, two died – one in his 80’s, one a fat man in his late 60’s with heart issues. For the others, the average sickness time was 4-5 days, many had minimal symptoms.

The so called long-corona is hard to define. The reported symptoms of ‘loss of memory’ and ‘tiredness’ are too subjective to validate – some people play games or have psychological and material reasons to report it. The more serious long-term effects have not been shown. From a friend who is a heart-lung specialist: post-corona X-rays show roughly the same damage to lungs as pneumonia and don’t last. We don’t know for sure, but why experiment with our bodies?

Given that, why would a healthy adult or child be vaccinated. What exactly are we trying to accomplish and at what risk? Is this about making elderly, obese and hypochondriacs feel better? That would be biological madness akin to ancient custom of sacrificing children. Sober up before it is too late.

If your odds of surviving corona are as low as you say

I haven’t yet read your comment, but based on this sentence, you haven’t read mine either, since nowhere did I write anything about my odds of surviving corona. I wish you well!

Agree. It is hard to understand why so many here – otherwise reflective, skeptical and rational even if we disagree – take the unthinking, dogmatic position take a shot or else. I have ascribed it to them taking the vaccine, they are committed. Whatever doubts they had before it’s too late, they want everyone with them.

people with children are understandably not well disposed towards people who have no children but have plenty of opinions about what OUR children should be forced to do

Precisely. It is mostly the people with no kids and no normal family lives, who are obsessive about telling others what to do. Dead-enders with no stake in the future. They are narcissists who put their own comfort above all else. Interestingly, many have conservative sympathies without understanding that we will only prevail by having families, by being normal, and not by words.

One evolutionary reason that helps societies is grandparents who live long enough to help with grandkids. The ‘babushka’ effect. Today we have an unfortunate combination of elderly with no grandkids and no biological reason for longevity, but with plenty of assets, opinions and power. An ugly combination, barren spinsters in Junior High School harassing the young. (Maybe there was a reason for the witch trials in the past, it may come to that. The young always win.)

Quoting you:

…so far I haven’t been infected either, but my plan is to live longer than one and a half years (or even decades), and I don’t want to continue doing all precautions

Can a reasonable person surmise that your fear getting corona? That suggests not very good odds on your part. (Maybe I am reading too much into it.)

Is taking a shot once year an ok as a “precaution”? For a 35-year male that would be 50 or more shots. I took the measles shot, but would I take it once a year, year after year…