Peter Sagan tests positive for COVID-19 for second time in less than a year

Scotland and Wales have consistently pursued stricter restrictions than England.

Given that other European countries have now made vaccines compulsory it doesn't seem unreasonable to speculate that the more draconian devolved nations may follow suit.

I certainly wouldn't put it past Drakeford but admittedly I don't follow Scottish politics anywhere near as closely as Welsh politics so perhaps I've been unfair on Sturgeon.

It is true that the Scottish Government has been more cautious than the UK Government through the pandemic.

Many of the same mistakes have been made ie Care Homes, but I would say that the SG has communicated better and retained more trust than the UK Government. Partly because of a willingness to admit it is not infallible and has made mistakes. I don't believe they would risk this on a fight on mandatory vaccination, nor would it sit with their claimed values.

I am certainly not an expert on Welsh politics

Judging by the reply of another poster, it looks like you are an expert on Scottish politics compared to others.

He is not worth a reply though.

Rich_cb wrote:

So many of our decisions impact on others, if I live an unhealthy lifestyle I'm likely to occupy significant healthcare resources when I get older. At some point this may lead to insufficient resources being available to treat someone else who then suffers a negative outcome. My poor choices could cause harm for someone else yet I'm not mandated to live healthily. I suppose the 'my body, my choice' argument needs a caveat covering those of sound mind only because otherwise it wouldn't be compatible with compulsory mental health treatments, which mostly in favour of.

Indeed - but again it's not binary is it? It's not just financial impacts on other via your own lifestyle choices either. It's a question - as always - of degree.

An example: smoking. We - reasonably, I'd say - impose restrictions above those limiting your own potential financial burden on the system.  If you're above a certain age (always restrictions...) you're free to smoke. Yes, this is made slightly more difficult by e.g. hiding the packets, restrictions on advertising. Nothing to stop you smoking in general, in your private space, in public. Oh - but actually we do say "this can have a (small) impact on others. So you can't smoke in (list of places)". I've no idea if smoking "at" someone could be considered an offense - I doubt it but not a lawyer...

It's not "mandated" but we do indeed have - reasonably - a whole range of measures with varying degrees of force or scope aimed at making people "comply" (if you will) on issues that might incur costs / harms to others. We have both "positive" (rewards) and negative. I imagine you'd be perfectly happy with many. (Especially if you're OK with compulsory mental health treatment - which I'd say is more of a grey area the more experience you have of it).

I certainly wouldn't defend all of these but it's not the case that there are none and the particular round are exceptional or outrageous. I'm sure we'll differ - both in details and in degree of certainty. I imagine you are most likely someone with a greater degree of morality than me - or at least with a more definite morality than me!

Rich_cb wrote:

My poor choices could cause harm for someone else yet I'm not mandated to live healthily.

True ... but the NHS already refuses to carry out some procedures in patients where their lifestyle is a mjor factor (obesity, for example) and not just in cases where the lifestyle impacts directly on the procedure itself. 

I think that's more a risk:benefit thing.

If you're obese and need a Knee Replacement, for example, then the operation will carry greater risks and deliver fewer benefits.

If the risk:benefit ratio is skewed too much towards risk then the NHS will not routinely fund it.

Rich_cb wrote:

My poor choices could cause harm for someone else yet I'm not mandated to live healthily.

You're not, and rightly so, but if your unhealthy choices put others at risk then you will be sanctioned, e.g. you're quite entitled to drink yourself into oblivion, but not to drive a car when you're drunk; you're entitled to smoke all you want, but not to do it on a petrol station forecourt. In the same way, anyone is at liberty to refuse the vaccine or boosters and take their chances on getting the virus, but should not then expect unencumbered access to venues, transport etc where the unvaccinated are banned for the safety of others.

It's rather tiresome when you just selectively quote and ignore the wider point Rendel.

An unhealthy lifestyle does put others at risk.

The evidence suggests that a double vaccinated person could be just as great a risk to others as an unvaccinated person, potentially an even greater risk if the unvaccinated person has previously recovered from COVID.

How can you justify different rules for the double vaccinated in that context?

Rich_cb wrote:

It's rather tiresome when you just selectively quote and ignore the wider point Rendel.

That's hilarious when you are selectively choosing to claim that being double vaccinated is no protection to others, something which is only true of the Omicron variant and not, for example, Delta, and at the same time ignoring the fact that vaccine + boosters offers 60%-85% protection against transmission. Roughly 70% (35M of 52M) of people in the UK who received the first vaccine have now had both second vaccine and booster as well*; you're trying to sustain your argument on the back of a scenario that is already one applicable only to a minority, and that minority is getting smaller by the day.

*https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/vaccinations

Omicron represented 95% of COVID infections when the government stopped publishing further breakdowns on 31/12.

Given that was just over a month after the first cases were detected it's safe to assume that Delta is no longer significant.

We know that Omicron protection from the booster drops rapidly and we know that double vaccination offers little or no protection against Omicron.

8 million of those who have received the booster are now over 10 weeks post dose when effectiveness drops to <50% and possibly under <20%.

Given these facts I'll ask again;

How can you justify different rules for the double vaccinated compared to the unvaccinated?

Is it justifiable to have different rules for those who have had boosters given the clearly limited long term efficacy?

You're right, I blame their paymasters, the Labour government. Same with the BBC which is clearly not effectively challenging the narrative coming from Keir Starmer's premiership. It's the current reckless disregard of facts and pushing of multiple spurious narratives which means that truth is the casualty - which people like Donald Trump were shut down for trying to stand up to.

In fact I'm would like a bit more challenge from eg. the BBC - albeit they're funded by the government so you get the BBC that the establishment are brave enough to allow, or not. Otherwise I'm pretty happy that we can indeed easily reach a range of opinions and actual facts. As a baseline see Russia or Hong Kong recently, or try Poland or Hungary if you'd like closer countries.

Being accurate - I'm not sure it's that the science is politicised. Science is about estabilishing facts and using them to build explanatory and ideally predictive hypotheses - and correcting these. Politics is about taking decisions and communicating.

If politicians are ignoring the science or misrepresenting it, or alternatively using "but science" as a cover for poor decision-making (or none) then that's... politics. Ideally - with truth on our side - we could deploy a reasoned and factual style of argument - but of course in human affairs that doesn't always win out.

Same for scientists making pronouncements about their personal / political beliefs which are incorrect, or those that have crossed the line into politics and are apparently trying to use their "scientific" cred as political coin. (Hello Baron Winson).

If scientists are doing bad science then hopefully the process of science will catch that before the results have negative impacts. This doesn't always happen of course, see MMR vaccine for one. Open question as to how effective the whole process is for that and indeed what science is "for" (qui bono).

I do like Fraser Nelson.

Had a digital subscription to the Spectator for a while, may have to renew it.

I think it's the reporting of the science that is problematic, worst case scenarios are presented as likely outcomes, ultimately this undermines trust and damages public health. The boy who cried wolf and all that.

Rich_cb wrote:

I do like Fraser Nelson. Had a digital subscription to the Spectator for a while, may have to renew it. I think it's the reporting of the science that is problematic, worst case scenarios are presented as likely outcomes, ultimately this undermines trust and damages public health. The boy who cried wolf and all that.

https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-coronavirus-modelling-idUSL1N2...

Garage at Large wrote:

This Reuters you mean? https://www.pfizer.com/people/leadership/board_of_directors/james_smith

Completely unbiased, I'm sure

I am not surprised you show such poor intellectual rigor that you resort to a vague insinuation of an ad hominem fallacy rather than address the facts presented. 

Rich_cb wrote:

I think it's human nature to resist changing our beliefs. If vaccines ......

Oh fack me, I can't read any more of this post

Have you ever changed your beliefs rich ?

Many times.

Nuclear power.
Meat Eating.
Cycle Helmets...
Etc.

If the evidence suggests I'm wrong I very much try to change my beliefs accordingly.

Incorrect.  Recent Jabs (i.e. Boosters) have been shown to reduce incidences of Omicron Infections, hence limit the spread.

https://www.health.gov.au/news/atagi-statement-on-the-omicron-variant-an...

"Strong evidence has accumulated over the past two weeks to indicate that booster doses of COVID-19 vaccines are likely to increase protection against infection with the Omicron variant."

Garage at Large wrote:

Who mentioned boosters? Not me.

You know the booster is a vaccine, don't you?

Steve K wrote:

..

You know the booster is a vaccine, don't you?

Can't be. Begins with "B". Vaccine begins with "V". 

Garage at Large wrote:

Steve K wrote:

Garage at Large wrote:

Who mentioned boosters? Not me.

You know the booster is a vaccine, don't you?

Logic: all boosters are vaccines, but not all vaccines are boosters. Boosters are a subset of vaccines, like: All cats are animals, but not all animals are cats. Cats are a subset of animals. Therefore: when I wrote "vaccine", it cannot be inferred that I meant "booster". In the same way as if I wrote "some animals have 8 legs", it cannot be inferred that I mean "some cats have 8 legs".

You said being vaccinated did not protect against getting covid.  To be (as) fully vaccinated (as possible) against the omicron variant (and, indeed, delta) you need to have had the booster.   So the person with the faulty logic is - as usual - you.  But I have broken my new year's resolution by feeding the troll.

Steve K wrote:

To be (as) fully vaccinated (as possible) against the omicron variant (and, indeed, delta) you need to have had the booster.

Ah - but why not just have the booster, and skip the other vaccinations?

Considering he first caught Covid in february when he could not have been vaccinated, I don't feel he can be blamed for that.

After that, who is to say that having antibodies from having recovered from covid is worse than having antibodies from vaccination?

Yes people can catch it twice (as he has) but vaccinated people can also catch it.

wycombewheeler wrote:

After that, who is to say that having antibodies from having recovered from covid is worse than having antibodies from vaccination?

Well, scientists: the ZOE/KCL study found:

The ZOE COVID Study, last month, found that vaccines offer greater protection against COVID-19 than natural antibodies. It found that an unvaccinated person with a previous COVID-19 infection has around 65 per cent protection against catching it again. But that two doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine gave 71 per cent protection against infection, and two doses of the Pfizer vaccine gave 87 per cent protection. 

Additionally, 20% of people who have had Covid have no antibodies to it at all. I guess if you paid someone to undertake an antibody analysis of your blood and found they were as high or higher than they would be in a vaccinated person you could argue that you don't need the vaccine (though there is evidence that natural immunity decays more rapidly than the vaccine).

Rendel Harris wrote:

It found that an unvaccinated person with a previous COVID-19 infection has around 65 per cent protection against catching it again. But that two doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine gave 71 per cent protection against infection,

That's less than a 10% difference, and doesn't justify treating survivors differently from double vaccinated. IMO. In fact the difference between pfizer and AZ is greater, so unless we are going to treat those vaccinated with AZ as higher risk than those vaccinated with pfizer you can't really justify different treatment for those who have survivied the virus.

I think we should be focusing first on those that are not vaccinated and have never had it.

It's all a bit like the outcry against low vaccination rates for professional footballers, when they are higher than average for their age group.

wycombewheeler wrote:

Considering he first caught Covid in february when he could not have been vaccinated, I don't feel he can be blamed for that.

That's fair

wycombewheeler wrote:

After that, who is to say that having antibodies from having recovered from covid is worse than having antibodies from vaccination?

If it was like chicken pox this may have merit. The antibodies are produced by the body in response to the pathogen exposed and would be essentially identical, assuming identical pathogen.

As for "who is to say". Well my money would be on medical advice, not Peter Sagan's contrariness. He's hardly covered himself in glory regarding his judgement in the past

wycombewheeler wrote:

Yes people can catch it twice (as he has) but vaccinated people can also catch it.

Yes they can. Not sure how this stack s up to "he has a point". 

The difference is that going to get a booster (or a facking 1st jab in his case) is that the pathogen is introduced in a controlled low-risk manner, and you are not infectious whilst your immune system responds.

This numpty is relying on his being strong enough to survive should he get it. Which is likely (on both counts: it is highly infectious, but contrary to what some politicians have extolled, this virus is not indiscriminate). Only he is then infectious whilst gaily ignoring other risk mitigations, and helping to spread it to others who are not as capable in fighting it off.

One of the "gotchas" that anti-vaxers seem to think they have is that the vac does not provide 100% immunity, so (the "logic" goes) it's a con.

Lets see how far they'd test that logic with cancer and chemo. What am I talking about? Some of them do.....

Captain Badger wrote:

The difference is that going to get a booster (or a facking 1st jab in his case) is that the pathogen is introduced in a controlled low-risk manner, and you are not infectious whilst your immune system responds.

I don't believe any of the covid vaccines actually use the virus itself - just mRNA to make the spike proteins so that the immune system can be primed to recognise it.

hawkinspeter wrote:

Captain Badger wrote:

The difference is that going to get a booster (or a facking 1st jab in his case) is that the pathogen is introduced in a controlled low-risk manner, and you are not infectious whilst your immune system responds.

I don't believe any of the covid vaccines actually use the virus itself - just markers so that the immune system can identify it.

Yes, sorry you are correct, most are mRNA vaccines I believe

Interestingly Smallpox was an example of a live vaccine, as is MMR.

There's an interesting Wiki article on vaccines that goes into detail on the different types.

Yes catching the virus is more risky, but that's in the past now. That was last February

And the medical experts have talked about super immunity from people who have had the vaccine and survivied the virus.

So being a covid survivor, his immune response is not worse than someone who has had one dose, while probably not as good as someone who has had 2 doses and a recent booster.

Does he increase the risk to others on the tour? Depends whether they are routinely testing. I would rather be in close contact with someone with a negative test result, than someone who has been fully vaccinated and may be unknowingly positive.

I think people should get vaccinated, but I have a litle more sympathy for those who were infected before they could be vaccinated and now can't see the point as 1) they survivied it already and 2) they have some level of imunne response and are not comparable to the completely unvaccinated.

With the high transmissibility of the omicron variant I thnk ithe number of people who will escape it completely is vanishingly small, also anyone who wanted the vaccine could have had it. So what is the detriment to others?