Not so great news from European Theaters- Page 2

[ACL2006]

Posted: 11/15/21 at 9:44am

BroadwayRox3588 said: "HogansHero said: "Austria has also announced that unvaccinated dumbasses in their country are being locked down. Would that we could do the same."

Ooh boy, wouldn't that be nice?"

That would never happen in the US. All the governors in all the red states wouldn't follow such orders(Florida, Texas, the Dakotas, etc.). The virus and any mandates in the US have been divided by politics since the beginning. Would like to see see other countries follow Singapore and make vaccinated patients pay out of pocket for any Covid related treatment.

[whatever2]

Posted: 11/15/21 at 10:13am

ACL2006 said: That would never happen in the US. All the governors in all the red states wouldn't follow such orders(Florida, Texas, the Dakotas, etc.).

That's true. But it's even more complicated here. Singapore, like most civilized countries, has universal health care; the scheme there is more complicated than in most European countries, but it still gives the national government clear authority to mandate the coverage exclusion. In the US, our patchwork approach to health care -- private employer plans, private individual plans, union plans, Obamacare, state Medicaid plans, et cetera -- would make such a mandate nearly impossible to implement.

FWIW, Delta Airlines did sort of this with its health insurance plan, adding a $200/month surcharge to the coinsurance amount paid by unvaccinated employees.

[HogansHero]

Posted: 11/15/21 at 11:38am

The impracticality of a lockdown of the unvaccinated in those states where it would be needed the most is manifest. It's not totally out of the question in states like New York where there are pockets of low vaccination rates but I think we have much easier means of making life unpleasant for the unvaccinated such that they are encouraged to come to their senses. The idea of denying coverage is intriguing. A sizable majority of the unvaccinated receive federally funded healthcare. Most of the rest receive federally regulated healthcare. Insurance companies would not be averse to being mandatorily taken off this risk. I don't expect to see any of this unless and until the inevitable 4th wave brings these costs into high relief. We shall see. 

[Highland Guy]

Posted: 11/15/21 at 11:53am

whatever2 said: "Singapore, like most civilized countries"

 

Civilized?  Singapore?  A country where consensual sexual relations between two men is illegal?  A country where caning is an acceptable form of punishment for certain offenses?  Civilized?

 

[Kad]

Posted: 11/15/21 at 12:16pm

Highland Guy said: "whatever2 said: "Singapore, like most civilized countries"



Civilized? Singapore? A country where consensual sexual relations between two men is illegal? A country where caning is an acceptable form of punishment for certain offenses? Civilized?

"

...and yet, in context, the comment is all the more damning to the US.

[Princeton2]

Posted: 11/19/21 at 12:08am

Just to say that there is a school of thought over the mainland Europe increases that its actually not releasing restrictions earlier that is what maybe driving the 4th wave.

The UK ended all restrictions in July and the expected wave so far has not come. Cases have increased but seem to be between 30 to 40k per day and hospitalizations and deaths seem to be relatively low and most cases are in school age children. Many of us expected a big wave as autumn hit but it hasn't happened....yet.  The UK is now on a downward trend when most of Europe is on a steep upward. A reversal of the situation over the summer and early autumn. The thinking is that one reason for this could be more people have had covid now in the UK that it's a form of herd immunity, plus a strong vaccine rollout.

As always with covid it's hard to know what's correlation rather than causation but I am surprised we aren't in a worse position than we are so far.

[JasonC3]

Posted: 11/19/21 at 6:21am

This is a good article about the difference in current COVID case numbers between the UK and the rest of Europe.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/nov/13/is-europes-covid-wave-coming-here-or-is-britain-ahead-of-the-curve