> Pro-life not pro-tyranny! Forcing people to take a vaccine that was rolled out almost immediately, without due process is not protecting anything.

It had 'due process', the same process any other vaccine would receive (including previous vaccines), culminating in an FDA authorization for use. All based on decades of research and 18 months of "shots in arms" data to back it up, when we know after a great deal of experience that vaccine side effects would show up in weeks, not years.

That doesn't make the Pfizer vaccine a "silver bullet" but it has not sideswiped due process and there's no additional data to be gained from waiting longer. So we're at the situation where if the courts decide this vaccine mandate is contrary to the public health, no vaccine mandate could be enforced either.

I'm just not sure how the mandate forces people to take a vaccine. Doesn't it say that people don't have to take it but then have to get tested weekly...if they want to stay at a company of over 100 employees? Doesn't that give people lots of options if they want to refuse taking a vaccine? 1) get tested weekly and 2) move to a smaller company are at least two alternatives to a vaccine, no?

I think there's a strong argument to be made for cruel and unusual punishment (or maybe not that but the unfairness of the consequences), as things ratchet up. For me, it seems fair to say people should get tested every week. If it were tested every 5 minutes or had to wear a full hazmat suit, then yes, I think that takes it wayyyy too far and then would be much more upset about it.

I guess I just don't see how the current alternatives prohibit people from participating in society. I guess some places say only vaccinated people, but most seem to just require a negative test within the last 72 hours or something.

So the mandate that employers of over 100 people must require them to be vaccinated or tested weekly is bad because eventually those people will have to stop participating in society?

Can’t find it now because google seems to have down ranked it. There have been cases of medication having very long term side effects which were not caught during trials. I’m thinking specifically of something that caused birth defects.

I don’t think it is wise to claim so much authority as you have when it is literally impossible to have FULL confidence. Are you going to take responsibility for the 1 in 1 million who reads your comments and goes on to suffer an adverse reaction?

What my one friend, who has a PhD in gene therapy, said is that these vaccines are safe now and in the long-term according to the best scientific knowledge we have at the moment. So I agree, there may be unforeseen ramifications of these vaccines in the future, true. I guess I just also believe there may be unforeseen ramifications in the future of having had covid-19 and I'm placing a bet that it's more likely that a previous covid-19 infection will be worse for me in the future than the mRNA vaccines I got. I have no certainty on it, I don't think anyone does, and it frustrates me sometimes when we don't mention that.

I think you're thinking of Thalidomide. It took the best scientific minds about 5 years to make the connection with it and birth defects.

This (admittedly unlikely) chance of long-term problems is one of many reasons that I believe that the vaccines being introduced into a mass audience at this time is the dumbest risk-management decision in the history of humanity.

I find it fascinating the number of people who seem to follow this reasoning, but don't think it's more likely that having covid-19 will cause long term problems years->decades down the line. Chicken pox causes singles, a number of viruses are associated with various cancers, but you think it's more likely that a carefully engineered and studied vaccine will have negative long-term effects than a novel virus?

> it is a short-lived antigen that trains your immune system, then goes away.

The injection being "short-lived" is completely irrelevant, as its effects on your body are permanent. As we don't have long-term knowledge of its effects, the (admittedly unlikely) possibility of long-term problems exists until proven otherwise.

Feel free to disagree if you want to, but I judge that risk to be a bigger threat to me and society than the comparatively small risk from Covid.

> This isn’t 1960, it’s 2021

I'm sure people in the 1950s were saying something similar, perhaps something like, "This isn't the ancient world and we're no longer messing around with leeches or trepanning. We have sophisticated modern laboratories, have modern medicine that has boosted life expectancy tremendously, and man has even harnessed the atom's powers. The days of medical errors are over."

Scientists should always be wary of hubris.

> It’s safe, certainly safer than COVID,

First you say it's safe, then you say it's safer. Which is it? I know how to identify weaselly language when I see it.

> and necessary to protect you, your family, your neighbors, and our society.

This is a slogan.

The risk-management calculation is different for every individual.

Can you please stop posting flamewar comments to HN, regardless of how wrong someone else is or you feel they are? It's not what this site is for, and it destroys what it is for.

If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.

Can you please stop posting flamewar comments to HN, regardless of how wrong someone else is or you feel they are? It's not what this site is for, and it destroys what it is for.

If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.

Edit: you posted 30 comments to this thread, and most of them broke the site guidelines. That's way beyond the pale. I'm not going to ban you for this because your commenting history before this looks fine, and everyone goes on tilt sometimes—but for heaven's sake please don't do it in the future!

Thank you. As a pharmacist, I am at the end of my rope when it comes to the war I fight every day against people who are disrespecting those who have died of this virus. What you are seeing here is the frustration of a health care professional. I will stop posting, but I take issue when one says the argument has devolved. I made some good points and then the ignorant horde starts using admins to stop a doctor from making points. I like this site and hope it will stay a place where people can share different views, as I have done here.

I hear the frustration and empathize, but we can't allow the downward spiral that results when people who feel strongly about something for good reason take it as a license to break the rules. I know it's not easy to do otherwise.

Please direct me to the 5 -10 year study on long term effects of the vaccine all knowing armchair general sir.

You are exposed to millions of antigens daily, and almost none are FDA approved. This isn’t at all like a new chemical entity, it is a short-lived antigen that trains your immune system, then goes away. This isn’t 1960, it’s 2021. It’s safe, certainly safer than COVID, and necessary to protect you, your family, your neighbors, and our society.

So a deflection it is.

This position assumes that all harmful side effects are detected, recorded and correctly ascribed to the vaccine.

What we see in reality is that "medical professionals" like yourself are loathe to accept that reports of problems could be linked to the vaccine, even if they occur very soon after vaccination. Instead they are routinely ignored or ascribed as coincidences. For instance, the system is still totally ignoring the apparently widespread appearance of menstrual problems in women who have been vaccinated despite it being one of the top reports in VAERS. Female friends of my girlfriend are reporting this problem at a very high rate, yet as far as people like you are concerned it doesn't happen at all.

It seems very much like virtually none of the reactions that would intuitively be caused by the vaccine are actually being recorded as such. In that environment your confidence would be severely misplaced.

You are exposed to millions of antigens daily, and almost none are FDA approved. This isn’t at all like a new chemical entity, it is a short-lived antigen that trains your immune system, then goes away. This isn’t 1960, it’s 2021. It’s safe, certainly safer than COVID, and necessary to protect you, your family, your neighbors, and our society. Also, it doesn’t affect fertility.