I’ve drawn no such lines. In fact I’ve refused the vaccine thus far. And none of my children have had the MMR. So please stop with the false assumptions. I merely stated what is plainly understood as a duty required of us in the sixth commandment. The WLC frames it this way:
The duties required in the sixth commandment are, all careful studies, and lawful endeavors, to preserve the life of ourselves and others by resisting all thoughts and purposes, subduing all passions, and avoiding all occasions, temptations, and practices, which tend to the unjust taking away the life of any; by just defense thereof against violence, patient bearing of the hand of God, quietness of mind, cheerfulness of spirit; a sober use of meat, drink, physic, sleep, labor, and recreations; by charitable thoughts, love, compassion, meekness, gentleness, kindness; peaceable, mild, and courteous speeches and behavior; forbearance, readiness to be reconciled, patient bearing and forgiving of injuries, and requiting good for evil; comforting and succoring the distressed, and protecting and defending the innocent.
I apologize if I read any of your remarks incorrectly. I’ve grown very accustomed to hearing people equate refusal to vaccinate with refusal to love your neighbor, so maybe I read something into what you were saying that you weren’t intending.
Here is another quote from Dr. Bart Classen, from a letter to then-president Trump in 2017: "The CDC should be honest with the public about the complete lack of any data that vaccines improve health. "
I give Dr. Classen and his followers zero credibility. I have been around long enough to have had an aunt who was in an iron lung due to polio, and when the polio vaccine became available my parents did not hesitate to have me vaccinated, even though there were problems with the early vaccines. I suppose Dr. Classen does not regard the near-absence of polio in the world today as an improvement to health.
That you say this suggests to me that you missed my point, which is that there is no one-size-fits-all policy. What is wrong and overblown to one person is right and appropriate to another person, and there is no way to accommodate both.
Let’s put some numbers on this. From the stats I’ve read, the risk of death from COVID-19 is about 0-0.1% for people aged 30-40 and about 0.5-2.5% for people aged 55-65. COVID-19 is not much of a risk for the first group but is a substantial risk for the second group. Perhaps you think that a 1 in 200 to 1 in 25 chance of dying is overblown, but I’d think you’d have a difficult time convincing most people otherwise. Beyond this, the 55-65 year-old age group is less likely to have kids at home and more likely to be retired or have wealth to ride through economic difficulty. So the best policy for dealing with COVID-19 from the perspective of the 55-65 year-old demographic is likely opposite to that from the perspective of the 30-40 year-old demographic. And which demographic holds more power in the U.S.?
@JosephSpurgeon reposting in response to your comment about about stats***. Because is important to see that distribution and magnitude are two very different measurements even though they may impact one another. Keep in mind these number are only for the state of Arizona.
***My apologies. I misread, who I was responding to, though I think it’s still helpful to restate numbers.
I also think it’s notable that the population comparatively more impacted by COVID illness and death are those under the age of 65. They had significantly higher increases than those over 65.
You have no disagreement from me in that the FDA and CDC would be much better off providing the most up-to-date and accurate information available, with revisions as necessary, rather than trying to push an overly simplified message as a means of patronizingly (and ineffectually) trying to control behavior.
Very low. From what I’ve read, taking hormonal birth control puts a woman at higher risk of blood clots than do COVID-19 vaccines.
Yes, that is always a possibility. But in this world of risk and uncertainty, decisions need to be made without full knowledge of the long run. Personally, you and your immediate family might be at very low risk from COVID-19 such that vaccination is unnecessary for your own health, but it’s a different story if you have older or vulnerable people in your extended family and community. Some members at my in-laws’ church got infected when younger relatives visited over Christmas, and several went to the ICU or died.
Let’s not confuse carrying out the protocol of Phase 3 trials as the same thing as actually doing ethical science. In the midst of a pandemic with thousands of people dying every week, once the preliminary trials have demonstrated that a vaccine is much less risky than the disease itself, it would be unethical not to allow people to voluntarily take it and possibly receive protection. Moreover, the administration of a vaccine to hundreds of thousands of people within a month will provide much more data much more quickly than any Phase 3 trial. If anything, the FDA has been far too conservative, and that has caused needless loss of life and economic damage.
There are many factors that legitimately could go into a decision to take or not take a vaccine, but “free-riding” seems inconsistent with the call for Christians to take up the cross. When an epidemic hit in the ancient world, pagans would scoot out of town but Christians were known for staying and risking their lives to care for the sick.
First allow me to extend my condolences. Those situations certainly have occurred numerously since the beginning of the pandemic. It is irresponsible and unloving for low risk people to not take measures to protect high risk people.
I agree higher risk people must weigh the risks according to their individual circumstances. I certainly did not preach against vaccines when my elderly mother and elderly in-laws all decided to get the vaccine. But when my sister in-law pressed that we and our children get vaccinated, I advised her that I have to make the best judgement I can to protect my family, and I am not yet convinced of benefits risk balance for us. am I being unloving to my in-laws? If the vaccine is efficacious, then our getting it doesn’t improve the safety of my mother and in-laws.
This is where Christians must be very careful to be educated, to pray, and to not violate their conscience.
I think if every high risk person were vaccinated and low risk persons began to practice exquisite hygiene when it comes to coughing and breathing on others, we would do a lot to drive the disease from us. N-95 masks need to be readily available and not treated as contraband. This would also help to restore some sense of normalcy as far as gatherings and what not.
I don’t think we have a hard and fast rule about citations. Two reasons caused me to request it:
It sounded like a reasonably informed person was writing, and that there may be more to read from him.
But with this sort of scientific claim, it’s especially helpful to have the ability to dig deeper when making judgments about whether to trust what is being said… because lots of reasonable-sounding (or maybe not so reasonable, depending on your viewpoint) things have been written that are either in bad faith or incredibly misguided.
Note that my request wasn’t meant to be a “source this or delete it.” Having said that, I wonder if there is some reason you couldn’t just provide a link? Perhaps it was originally a private FB post? If so, I’d rather you leave it posted and simply say why you can’t source it. It’s up to you, but I still found it informative with things I could research, even without a source.
“Let’s not confuse carrying out the protocol of Phase 3 trials as the same thing as actually doing ethical science.”
Agreed.
“once the preliminary trials have demonstrated that a vaccine is much less risky than the disease itself…”
Agreed. “The trials were designed to succeed.”
“None of the trials currently under way are designed to detect a reduction in any serious outcome such as hospital admissions, use of intensive care, or deaths. Nor are the vaccines being studied to determine whether they can interrupt transmission of the virus.”
“Three of the vaccine protocols—Moderna, Pfizer, and AstraZeneca—do not require that their vaccine prevent serious disease only that they prevent moderate symptoms which may be as mild as cough, or headache.”/
“free-riding” seems inconsistent with the call for Christians to take up the cross."
“the administration of a vaccine to hundreds of thousands of people within a month will provide much more data much more quickly than any Phase 3 trial.”
Are you suggesting that taking up the cross is a willingness to take part in the ongoing trial and those who refrain at present are not taking up the cross?
Yes, that’s the trade-off. You can wait months until a formal trial is finished to determine whether a vaccine is effective or not, during which time many people will certainly die, or you can administer a possibly ineffective vaccine to a large number of people and get answers sooner and possibly save many more lives.
You were the one who called yourself a “free rider”, not me. As I said, there are many legitimate factors that go in to deciding whether to be vaccinated or not. But I do think it is unchristian to look forward to reaping unearned benefits obtained by the sacrifices of other people, which is what “free-riding” means.
VAERS data already show injuries and deaths from covid vaccines. so the public should proceed with their eyes wide open and exercise an abundance of of caution.
Also, there are reports of alarming unscientific trends in vaccine studies:
I wouldn’t have used the term free-rider myself. I don’t believe in it. Not only am I not looking forward to the consequences of possible vaccine injuries and deaths, I am wanting the risks to be evaluated and praying for those who may suffer,
As there have already been many cases of “breakthrough” infections, I am not hopeful of receiving unearned benefits. My hope is actually in my immune system to fight against any illness. (Vitamin D deficiency has been clearly identified as a contributing factor in severe infections.)
It’s ones Christian duty to do due diligence in protecting others as well as oneself. So, I can not in good conscience “sacrifice” myself or my family by getting experimental vaccines.
I do understand that those who trust in the CDC and the pharmaceutical industry to take a different view.
I don’t think that is true at all. In my own state, that map shows some very strongly-Trump counties as somewhat more vaccine-friendly than some very blue counties.
Very often these types of maps turn into ethnographies-by-some-proxy, with the so-called “black belt” that runs through the heart of the South as being very different on some metric than the rest of the country. With this map, the black belt is pretty visible, but I wonder if the vaccine-shy on this map in the West are a proxy for American Indians. Again returning to my own state, I might hypothesize that Indian population by county would strongly correlate with the darker colors on the map.
But from a larger picture, I question some of the underlying data. It’s not normal for Minnesota to differ strongly from Wisconsin on almost anything. Ditto for Vermont and New Hampshire. The bell curves for MN/WI barely overlap, and the bell curves for VT/NH don’t overlap at all. This seems very strange to me.
Oh, and all four states voted for Biden, or at least wound up blue on the election maps, which might not be the same thing.
