|
|
JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
|
posted March 15, 2021 08:34 AM |
|
|
Not that I'm knowledgable in that area, but I read an article about a month ago, that the overwhelming majority of the AVAILABLE vaccine (that is, the vaccine, that is produced) is bought by the usual suspects, that is, the rich countries, and only a fraction of it goes into 2nd and 3rd world, with AstraZeneca making an unusual commitment of guaranteeing a comparatively high amount (as the only corp) for those countries.
The next-generation vaccines, on the other hand, cannot be produced, shipped and stored easily, which means, the production potential is quite limited, worldwide, and a sharing the knowledge wouldn't gain a lot in the near future, so in my opinion this is probably something to be seen generally, not for this specific case and pandemic.
We live in a capitalist world and they who can pay will be served. Eventually, someone DOES have to pay for this stuff, because without payment no development and production. The capitalist way to deal with this is generally to overprice the stuff for those who can pay (and are served first) and then to offer bargain deals later on, when everyone prepared to pay premium price has been served (and the profit has been made).
|
|
blizzardboy
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
Nerf Herder
|
|
posted March 15, 2021 01:29 PM |
|
|
Corribus said:
To be clear, artu, I'm not advocating one position or the other.
You have a funny way of 'not advocating one position or another', lol. You're instructing everybody in the basics of how a business works. Developers need to be incentivized or vaccines won't be developed. Investors aren't going to voluntarily go bankrupt or at least they're not going to voluntarily have their profits cut. That's where governments can step in, both with preventing bankruptcy and with suspending intellectual property. Intellectual property, by the way, isn't an indefinite right in the first place because the time window only lasts so long before anybody is allowed to produce a generic version. That doesn't seem to stop private funding as long a profit can be made. So why is it only a limited window? Why not make the window longer or even last forever? Won't that make development even more incentivized? (Answer: not really, and the cons greatly outweigh the pros)
Temporarily suspending intellectual property rights isn't going to just permanently decentivize developing vaccines, especially since this would be a once-in-a-generation emergency suspension to help the world get out of a global pandemic + global recession sooner, which is killing pretty much all sectors of business and not just one specific sector. This is exactly why capitalism is very good for generating wealth and creating upward mobility, but why it is also toxic if it's not restrained and regulated based on context, because you can easily run into a situation where the entire world ends up more poor and more dead because a tiny fraction don't want to lose on profits. Ditto for something like climate change. There's a temporary increase in profits for a small group of people at the expense of making life more miserable for everybody. There needs to be government intervention to force private to behave in a way that doesn't kill everybody.
____________
"Folks, I don't trust children. They're here to replace us."
|
|
blizzardboy
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
Nerf Herder
|
|
posted March 15, 2021 01:35 PM |
|
|
Corribus said:
You haven't convinced me it is
Okay.
I'm not getting into this because it would take me a really long time and I don't care enough to do that because people generally don't change their mind anyway. The book I read about this was 'Why we age and why we don't have to' and it goes into detail about this. Anyway, it's a really interesting read.
Long story short: aging doesn't have to be an inevitable biological process, which is why it should be regarded as a disease. This would also transform healthcare and make doctors more effective at what they do because right now a lot of healthcare is focused on treating individual diseases that barely extend life expectancy. For example, if tomorrow there was an absolute cure for Alzheimers it would improve average life expectancy for those people by less than a month since there are so many others factors that will kill them anyway. Treating that individual disease has a very tiny impact on the total lifespan and healthspan. Right now funding is highly preferential towards stuff like heart disease (among other things) because heart disease kills so many people, but it's not so much heart disease that is killing people as it is aging. If you treat heart disease they're just going to die shortly thereafter of something else.
____________
"Folks, I don't trust children. They're here to replace us."
|
|
blizzardboy
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
Nerf Herder
|
|
posted March 15, 2021 02:35 PM |
|
|
I don't even think this block against the supermajority is going to benefit rich countries because increasing the lockdowns and restrictions is going to affect businesses and institutions globally, which trickles into countries that have already been vaccinated. Some are saying the poorest countries might not be vaccinated until 2024 lol, but then surely herd immunity would kick in by the point anyway.
Rich nations have large and bulky social support programs and they've lost enormous sums of money this year, which means people are scared, and people don't think about the long-term when they're scared. They just think about survival and next week or next year. So even though expediating vaccinations through generics would speed up a return to normality, nobody wants to budge from their cave of safety. I'm picking on Canada, but Canada is a pretty extreme example. It potentially has enough vaccinations back-ordered to do 10 doses per capita  It's just bonkers, and it's a classic example of the sort of stupid actions that can happen when things get a little bit scary.
Anyway, to summarize:
1) The block hurts developing countries.
2) The block hurts rich countries.
3) Lots more people are going to die.
4) A temporary suspension of intellectual property for patents in the worst global pandemic since 1918 does not mean nobody will risk developing vaccines anymore. That argument is weak as water, and these developers can be compensated and/or bailed out.
5) Canada must be stopped.
____________
"Folks, I don't trust children. They're here to replace us."
|
|
Corribus
Hero of Order
The Abyss Staring Back at You
|
|
posted March 15, 2021 04:10 PM |
|
Edited by Corribus at 16:23, 15 Mar 2021.
|
blizzardboy said:
You have a funny way of 'not advocating one position or another', lol.
I'm challenging one position by arguing the opposite position. In any ethical dilemma, there are usually sound arguments for both positions. The truth is, most people, when confronted by a dilemma, make instantaneous decisions based on emotion, cultural beliefs, or other non-analytic heuristics. Such choices become rapidly crystallized, which on the long term average leads to poor policy. The best policy decisions usually emerge from careful consideration of risks and benefits associated with all the available choices. In my experience, the best way to consider the risks and benefits of different available choices is, when confronted by someone arguing one position, to take the stance of the opposite position and see where it gets you. Conventional approach in logic that also pays high dividends in the sciences. Look for weaknesses of the other side, look for strengths of your side. Then switch, repeat. Then make a decision.
Actually, it is a great way to tease out and challenge one's own preconceptions and biases. If you find yourself holding a certain belief on a matter, find someone who shares that belief, and try to argue the opposite position. Frequently very enlightening.
Quote:
Temporarily suspending intellectual property rights isn't going to just permanently decentivize developing vaccines, especially since this would be a once-in-a-generation emergency suspension to help the world get out of a global pandemic + global recession sooner, which is killing pretty much all sectors of business and not just one specific sector.
Businesses operate through evaluation of market risks. They use market risks to prioritize product development and set prices. If businesses come to believe that governments are willing to suspend intellectual property rights, this introduces additional market risks. There are short and long term consequences. A government (or you) can argue that this is a "once in a lifetime thing, nothing to worry about, completely unusual circumstances", and that may be the intention. Businesses may not see it that way. Governments will often do what they can get away with. If governments suspend IP rights for this once-in-a-lifetime pandemic and get away with it, who is to say the government won't suspend them again a few years down the road for something a little less urgent, and something even a little less urgent the year after? Maybe it won't happen. But that's the meaning of risk. You don't know - it's probability. One possible outcome is that, because there's higher risk, companies increase pharmaceutical prices across the board, or for specific products (vaccines). Companies may also decide that, the next time a pandemic roles around, it's not worth it to develop a vaccine, since the changes are high that governments will just engage in corporate theft again.
Quote:
why it is also toxic if it's not restrained and regulated based on context, because you can easily run into a situation where the entire world ends up more poor and more dead because a tiny fraction don't want to lose on profits.
Even if we agree that suspending IP rights is justified in this instance, justified does not mean consequence-free. You need to take a long view and ask whether the short-term gains justify the long term consequences to prices and future vaccine development.
This of course also is beside the question of whether suspending IP protection is even an effective means of achieving the ultimate goal of better access to safe and effective vaccines. Something may be good politics but bad policy. I.e., governments may suspend IP because the people like it, and reap the consequences, but achieve very little public health good in the bargain. (Having access to patented technology does not necessarily translate into an effective product on a useful timescale. )
(A similar argument, by the way, may be made for raising the minimum wage, which looks great for politicians but may not achieve what its intended to achieve. Good politics, questionable policy. But I guess that's a debate for another day.)
Quote:
Ditto for something like climate change. There's a temporary increase in profits for a small group of people at the expense of making life more miserable for everybody. There needs to be government intervention to force private to behave in a way that doesn't kill everybody.
From a 10,000 ft view, sure there are similarities. But the risks and benefits are completely different, so the decision algorithm is different too. Corporate risk is involved, yes, so commodity prices will be impacted by climate change regulations. But I would argue in this case that climate change regulations would have less of an insidious impact on corporations than suspension of IP protections and, unlike IP suspension, climate change regulations would also stimulate new economic sectors.
My opinion is that if you want to make vaccines more available, you (government) should incentivize companies to voluntarily waive their IP protections rather than forcefully suspend those protections. More carrot, less stick. Not only would this reduce risks (real and perceived) that I have mentioned but it would also increase the chance of actually having the policy outcome you are seeking: good vaccines distributed to more people on realistic timescales. Of course, the question is - what to use as a carrot?
____________
I'm sick of following my dreams. I'm just going to ask them where they're goin', and hook up with them later. -Mitch Hedberg
|
|
Corribus
Hero of Order
The Abyss Staring Back at You
|
|
posted March 15, 2021 04:16 PM |
|
|
blizzardboy said:
Long story short: aging doesn't have to be an inevitable biological process, which is why it should be regarded as a disease. This would also transform healthcare and make doctors more effective at what they do because right now a lot of healthcare is focused on treating individual diseases that barely extend life expectancy. For example, if tomorrow there was an absolute cure for Alzheimers it would improve average life expectancy for those people by less than a month since there are so many others factors that will kill them anyway. Treating that individual disease has a very tiny impact on the total lifespan and healthspan. Right now funding is highly preferential towards stuff like heart disease (among other things) because heart disease kills so many people, but it's not so much heart disease that is killing people as it is aging. If you treat heart disease they're just going to die shortly thereafter of something else.
I guess this is beyond the scope of the thread, but this argument makes no sense to me at all. Acknowledging that this is only a cursory attempt at sharing an viewpoint laid out in a presumably long book- the idea that "aging doesn't have to be an inevitable biological process" seems to be nonsense. Barring accident, it would seem to imply to me that you think immortality is possible. It also seems to completely ignore the role of heredity in disease states. I guess I also still don't understand how you are defining a disease.
____________
I'm sick of following my dreams. I'm just going to ask them where they're goin', and hook up with them later. -Mitch Hedberg
|
|
Corribus
Hero of Order
The Abyss Staring Back at You
|
|
posted March 15, 2021 05:13 PM |
|
|
OhforfSake said:
Not aging and immortality isn't the same thing, I believe.
Blizz has not deigned to offer a definition of aging or disease. He has offered the opinion that "if this doesn't kill you, that will", and "this" and "that" aren't diseases themselves, but symptoms of the real disease, which is aging. By which I infer that if aging, averred as the mother of most so-called afflictions, is itself cured, then "this" and "that" become irrelevant. So by what means do we die, other than freak accident or maybe congenital condition (although in the latter I'm also unclear, because congenital condition can contribute to heart disease, etc.)? Anything else is a symptom of aging, and therefore eliminated when we cured aging, no?
____________
I'm sick of following my dreams. I'm just going to ask them where they're goin', and hook up with them later. -Mitch Hedberg
|
|
blizzardboy
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
Nerf Herder
|
|
posted March 15, 2021 07:15 PM |
|
|
Medicine is changing so quickly that this will probably be the last sort of pandemic where a vaccine will take this long to develop. But let's say another airborne sickness as bad or worse than the current COVID happens 40 years from now. By that point in time places like India, Indonesia, Nigeria, S. Africa, etc., are going to have vastly more infrastructure and homegrown expertise to be part of the development process. The cost in development is also expected to keep falling.
Basically, it's not a big concern to me if at some point several decades in the future, a company will be hesitant to develop a vaccine because once upon a time a long time ago, people ignored their [fictional] intellectual property rights that let them exclusively sell vaccines to developing countries during a global pandemic. I'll agree it might have been a good thing that they believed they could do this going into it - give a predator the smell of fresh meat, yes? - but now that we actually have the vaccine and many more patents are rolling out, it's time to pull the rug out now that they've accomplished what they need to accomplish. COVID 2019 is a unique scenario and any future pandemics are going to have a completely different landscape anyway. Development will be cheaper and faster and competition will rise and developing countries won't have their current dependency, at least not nearly to the same degree. Everything will be different and 2019/20/21 will be forgotten by the average person. Due to the extreme uniqueness of this situation I'm simply not concerned about the slippery slopes that you are worried about. I think what you are talking about is very unlikely. The IPs are suspended during a global emergency that hasn't happened in 100 years. That's it.
Incentivizing these companies to waive their IPs would also be good and accomplish the goal, but you're putting the ball in their court when that isn't necessary in the first place, and it would probably result in a lot, lot more compensation. I'm fine with it, but I'm also fine with the faster option.
____________
"Folks, I don't trust children. They're here to replace us."
|
|
blizzardboy
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
Nerf Herder
|
|
posted March 15, 2021 07:29 PM |
|
|
@Cor
All of the other things you mentioned are indeed diseases, but so is aging. Conditions arising from genetics are considered a disease, but since aging is something that affects 100% of the population, we view it differently. Then again, cancer is also something that affects 100% of the population. Often times somebody dies of something else before they have a chance to get around to dying of cancer, but if they had survived later, perhaps by a few years or by several decades, every person will eventually get cancer, as cancerous cells are destroyed before they can spread less and less quickly and they become increasingly susceptible to forming larger tumors. It's not a question of 'if' but 'when'.
____________
"Folks, I don't trust children. They're here to replace us."
|
|
blizzardboy
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
Nerf Herder
|
|
posted March 15, 2021 08:56 PM |
|
|
USA still has a pretty high death rate from auto accidents, but that's largely because we're a 3rd world country that is slightly more civilized than cannibals and we treat pedestrians like cattle being sent to the slaughterhouse. At any rate, that is expected to sharply decrease in the near future.
Slowing, stopping, or reversing aging (the third one isn't as far fetched as what you probably think) isn't going to make people immortal, but it will by default treat the vast majority of other diseases that eventually kill people.
____________
"Folks, I don't trust children. They're here to replace us."
|
|
Corribus
Hero of Order
The Abyss Staring Back at You
|
|
posted March 15, 2021 09:41 PM |
|
|
blizzardboy said:
All of the other things you mentioned are indeed diseases, but so is aging. Conditions arising from genetics are considered a disease, but since aging is something that affects 100% of the population, we view it differently. Then again, cancer is also something that affects 100% of the population. Often times somebody dies of something else before they have a chance to get around to dying of cancer, but if they had survived later, perhaps by a few years or by several decades, every person will eventually get cancer, as cancerous cells are destroyed before they can spread less and less quickly and they become increasingly susceptible to forming larger tumors. It's not a question of 'if' but 'when'.
I think you should start finding your information elsewhere, blizz. This is pseudoscience.
Even if it was true, saying 'cancer is something that affects everyone, because if you get rid of every other form of death, everyone would get cancer and die' is about as useful as, 'lightning is something that affects everyone, because if you get rid of ever other form of death, everyone would eventually be struck by lightning and die'. Not to mention, cancer is not only associated with age. Kids get cancer, young adults get cancer, old people get cancer. Cancer can be influenced by genetics, and can be generated by exposure to certain pathogens, and can be associated with exposure to environmental stimuli, including chemicals, light, radiation.
Honestly, not even sure where to begin with this. So I probably shouldn't. But you may consider reading a real book about cancer. For something accessible, I suggest the Emperor of All Maladies, Mukherjee.
____________
I'm sick of following my dreams. I'm just going to ask them where they're goin', and hook up with them later. -Mitch Hedberg
|
|
blizzardboy
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
Nerf Herder
|
|
posted March 15, 2021 10:53 PM |
|
|
Lol.
Maybe I'll get around to it someday, but right now I'm still fine with reading stuff from one of Harvard's top scientists. A pseudoscientist. I'm not mad at you for not agreeing with me because I'm just giving short answers and not giving the book justice, and I wouldn't be sold on it if I just read some paragraphs about it on an internet forum either, but I don't honestly feel like talking forever about this through text. I don't live under a rock and I obviously already know that young people and people exposed in various environments can get cancer, but it's nonetheless something that will affect 100% of people eventually if they dodge various other bullets, and those odds dramatically rise more and more as they get older whereas the chances of being struck by lightning do not. Your analogy kind of sucks.
|
|
Corribus
Hero of Order
The Abyss Staring Back at You
|
|
posted March 15, 2021 11:27 PM |
|
Edited by Corribus at 23:54, 15 Mar 2021.
|
Blizz, just because an idea came from a scientist from Harvard, or wherever, it means nothing. The road of delusion is paved with books, articles, and websites written by people who misinterpret, willfully or otherwise, literature published by credentialed scientists. And in any case, coming on here and blathering about Harvard scientists saying something about cancer holds about as much water as cheese cloth. Give me sources. I will read them. I have access to primary literature.
____________
I'm sick of following my dreams. I'm just going to ask them where they're goin', and hook up with them later. -Mitch Hedberg
|
|
Neraus
Promising
Legendary Hero
Pain relief cream seller
|
|
posted March 16, 2021 08:39 AM |
|
|
Nobel prize Luc Montagnier said SARS-Cov2 came from a lab.
I think that's enough to cast doubt on the idea that past credit makes you an absolute authority in your field.
____________
Noli offendere Patriam Agathae quia ultrix iniuriarum est.
ANTUDO
|
|
blizzardboy
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
Nerf Herder
|
|
posted March 16, 2021 12:36 PM |
|
|
Neraus said:
Nobel prize Luc Montagnier said SARS-Cov2 came from a lab.
I think that's enough to cast doubt on the idea that past credit makes you an absolute authority in your field.
HC
That's not how it works. 'Being wrong' doesn't mean you're not an authority. It just means you were wrong. If you want to be right all the time at your job then I guess you can work at a ticket booth or lemonade stand or something lol.
____________
"Folks, I don't trust children. They're here to replace us."
|
|
Neraus
Promising
Legendary Hero
Pain relief cream seller
|
|
posted March 16, 2021 01:11 PM |
|
|
And thus, don't go around following "absolute authorities" for they don't exist, there are just people who can be experts but still take what they say with a grain of salt, thank you for agreeing.
____________
Noli offendere Patriam Agathae quia ultrix iniuriarum est.
ANTUDO
|
|
Kipshasz
Undefeatable Hero
Elvin's Darkside
|
|
posted March 16, 2021 02:00 PM |
|
|
Loving how the resident special ed kid tries to argue with a guy who has more expertise in this certain field than all of us combined. and his best argument is the science worship method.
____________
"Kip is the Gavin McInnes of HC" - Salamandre
"Ashan to the Trashcan", "I got PTSD from H7. " - LizardWarrior
|
|
Corribus
Hero of Order
The Abyss Staring Back at You
|
|
posted March 16, 2021 03:27 PM |
|
Edited by Corribus at 15:29, 16 Mar 2021.
|
Clearly missed my point; otherwise there wouldn't be a need for strawmen.
But please leave the insults off the table Kip.
____________
I'm sick of following my dreams. I'm just going to ask them where they're goin', and hook up with them later. -Mitch Hedberg
|
|
husham123
Famous Hero
Yes
|
|
posted March 16, 2021 08:35 PM |
|
|
Corribus said:
Blizz, just because an idea came from a scientist from Harvard, or wherever, it means nothing.
Second that. Most of the Conservative Cabinet in the UK are all Oxford/Cambridge graduates and are all - for lack of a better word - imbeciles. Their method of dealing with this situation was all specifically to just cross their hands and tell everyone to do nothing, literally nothing, instead of making an effort to shut down this threat before it spiralled out of control (which it did anyways).
Their austerity measures meant that it took them too much time - time they didn't have - to gather the necessary resources to get the production lines to produce their joke of a Lateral-Flow test that it also took them too long to distribute and create more of.
BoJo went back on his word more than 7 times in one week in regards to the exams and the way the education system would work, first saying there would be no school/college, then saying schools would be reopened, then saying they're closed again, then it's opened with testing, then telling us we won't have to wear masks, then saying we will have to etc etc.
That's not even mentioning how many U-Turns that muppet forced the entire country to go through. They're complaining about how they're running out of money, but shutting down 'non-essential' small businesses that follow government measures and are prone to inspections either way. Then, they're promising compensations (furloughs) for business owners which are later removed from them, as they are pushed to reopen two weeks later (which realistically they cannot, as it takes them about two weeks to get all the necessary documents to reopen the business), only to have to close less than a month afterwards. It's such a joke.
And now, this Cabinet is engaged in this stupid scheme about vaccine patents, with Matt Hancock giving production rights for test tubes to his damn neighbor.
Seeing as all these clowns graduated from Oxford and Cambridge, supposedly prestigious, competitive Universities, that consistently force their students to make progress on their courses, you'd think they'd be at least slightly effective at dealing with this situation, when you have other so-called 'experts' proposing solutions that were proven to work when applied.
____________
What the darn-diddily-doodily did you just say about me, you little witcharooney? I’ll have you know I graduated top of my class at Springfield Bible College, and I’ve been involved in numerous secret
|
|
blizzardboy
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
Nerf Herder
|
|
posted March 16, 2021 09:03 PM |
|
|
I agree that a prestigious education by itself doesn't make a person authoritative, because prestigious universities are linked (at least) as much to the economic class a person was born into. That may be slowly changing but for anyone who went to university before 2000, it was for the most part based on unearned privileges in life. A politician in their 60s would have gone to Oxford around the 1980s, which was a very elitist environment and so a person can have an impressive resume and still be sort of a moron.
But there's a difference between going to a university as a student and checking off "degree" on your list, and teaching at a university, or being the head of a department of a university. This is the molecular geneticist (he isn't the only one) who is arguing that aging should be redefined as a disease:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Andrew_Sinclair
I'm not saying, "David Sinclair is a bigshot scientist and he is automatically right about everything", because obviously it doesn't work like that (although imo his arguments are brilliant and he really showed how archaic modern medicine can sometimes be) but it's not as if I got this idea by reading a website that was written by a person in a trailer who lives with eight ferrets and a cobra.
|
| |
|
|
This thread is pages long: 
