My take: rewarding bad behavior.

They should tax people $100 a month for every month they don’t get the shot.

A couple of days ago my sports medicine doc thanked me, rather emphatically, for being fully vaccinated.

I do not understand why he simply doesn't refuse service to anyone who isn't fully vaccinated. He's booked out for months. He's the best doc around (after 12 years of torment, he has finally figured out the underlying cause of my peripheral neuropathy--something countless MDs have failed to do over all these years.)

Same with stores, rstaurants, service providers of all kinds. If they all had signs on their doors that said, "no shoes, no shirt, no vaccine card, no service," we'd be a helluva lot closer to full coverage. Not to mention all employers and schools requiring it.

There's a lot of momentum out there already. I posted one example in the COVID odds and ends thread

More:

A whole bunch of companies either requiring vaccines or offering incentives.

Broadway

Emmys



Plus there are lots more, including various government agencies (federal, state, local) actively considering the requirement.

In Chicago, the Lollapalooza music festival is requiring proof of vaccination or a negative test for people to gain entry. That's good, but there's no mask requirement, so any breakthrough cases among the vaccinated will mean new cases. It's an interesting test, with 100K people attending each day for four days.

The schools (except for universities, where a vaccination requirement is pretty much a given) is a whole other ballgame. Around here elementary and high school districts are a war between the mask and don't mask crowd. I have no idea what will happen if a vaccination is required.

I still don't understand why health insurance companies aren't providing cash back for fully vaccinated, or a no-vaccination fee for those who are refusing but have no medical reason to do so.

quote:

As COVID case numbers tick up again, but most people who are being hospitalized are among the unvaccinated, some people are floating the idea that health insurance companies could or should charge a premium for anyone who doesn't get the shot.

"They do charge more for smokers, but that's really the exception and not the rule," said Brandeis University's Michael Doonan, the executive director of the Massachusetts Health Policy Forum.

Doonan said it would be difficult to charge a premium on an individual basis while the vaccines are under emergency use authorization -- even though the unvaccinated are costing insurers more.

quote:

But, Doonan said, those increased insurance costs will likely be recouped another way -- through employers.

"Companies who are negotiating with insurance companies, if they have a whole bunch of employees who are unvaccinated and their costs go up this year, next year their premiums are going to go through the roof," Doonan said.

https://www.nbcboston.com/news...nvaccinated/2439579/

My uni can't yet mandate because the vaccine is still not fully authorized. But we're making life more difficult for those who want to exercise their "freedom."

So the challenge to Indiana University's vaccine policy was denied.

edit: And here's the National Law Review's take:

https://www.natlawreview.com/a...university-s-vaccine

What's different for you guys?

Don't know. Haven't paid much attention because I'm not teaching next year.

We'll likely have very few refuseniks, however. Most of our students have a few IQ points to rub together, and even our right-wingers don't seem particularly anti-science. They'll also respond to the negative incentives for remaining vectors.

We're still tallying the numbers who remain unvaccinated. That's problematic because people have been told to log into a particular website (Kallaco) and upload a picture of their card. The fact that "only 75%" have done so doesn't really tell us the story of who is truly unvaccinated.

Lollapalooza is an outdoor music festival, which has a lower potential for transmission, but many of the people are staying somewhere overnight...

Chicago's 7 day rolling average of tested postives is currently up to 206 (mid 30ish early June).

quote:

Originally posted by Nina:
I still don't understand why health insurance companies aren't providing cash back for fully vaccinated, or a no-vaccination fee for those who are refusing but have no medical reason to do so.

From Kaiser Health News:

quote:

Analysis: Don’t Want a Vaccine? Be Prepared to Pay More for Insurance.

https://khn.org/news/article/a...-more-for-insurance/

quote:

Originally posted by Piano*Dad:
Don't know. Haven't paid much attention because I'm not teaching next year.

We'll likely have very few refuseniks, however. Most of our students have a few IQ points to rub together, and even our right-wingers don't seem particularly anti-science. They'll also respond to the negative incentives for remaining vectors.

We're still tallying the numbers who remain unvaccinated. That's problematic because people have been told to log into a particular website (Kallaco) and upload a picture of their card. The fact that "only 75%" have done so doesn't really tell us the story of who is truly unvaccinated.

We're dealing with the same issue here. Part of the challenge is that most faculty are still on summer break. There is a difference between "I'm telling you no," vs no response.