NYC Emergency Executive Order 225

It's high relative to the south or florida but the order says the vaccination rate is 56%.

Seattle has a 78% vaccination rate [1] and SF has a 71% rate [2]. NYC is pretty low rate of vaccination relative to major libral cities. It seems that boston, a comparable east-coast city has a closer, but still higher vaccination rate of 65% (link somewhat out of date) [3]

[1] https://kingcounty.gov/~/media/depts/health/communicable-dis...

[2] https://sf.gov/data/covid-19-vaccinations

[3] https://www.mass.gov/doc/boston-vaccination-data-report-july...

You aren't getting vaccinated for yourself - you're getting vaccinated to help create a safe environment where this pandemic can be stamped out. We've lived with this for more than a year now - it isn't just going to magically disappear and, if we haven't done anything by winter, it's going to get worse again.

Are you trying to make a general argument, or an argument specific to just vaccinations.

If the former, there is quite a bit of historical precedent that says otherwise. For example, the government does not have the authority to mandate that I have a motor vehicle, but they can ban me from walking or using a non-motorized vehicle on the freeways. I'm sure you can think of plenty of other examples where the government can require that you have something or meet particular conditions in order to do some activity or enter some place, but they cannot mandate that you have that something or meet those conditions.

> We should not be taking further steps to protect people who are able but not willing to be vaccinated.

Unvaccinated people increase risk for vaccinated people. There was a useful infographic in this Ars article [1]. Imagine two hypothetical states, each with a population of 1 million. State A is 70% vaccinated, state B 30%.

What you'd expect is state A to have 130 cases per week and B to have 5114.

In state A it would be 29 cases among the vaccinated and 101 among the unvaccinated. In B it would be 250 among the vaccinated, 4864 among the unvaccinated. That's a rate of 41 per million among the vaccinated in A, and 833 per million in B. A vaccinated person is 20 times as likely to get infected in state B.

For the unvaccinated, the rate in A is 337 per million and in B it is 6949. An unvaccinated person is 20 times as likely to get infected in B.

Hospitalizations would be 1.4 in A and 18.8 in B.

In A that would be 0.1 among the vaccinated and 1.3 among the unvaccinated. That's 0.14 per million and 4.3 per million respectively.

In B it would be 0.3 vaccinated hospitalizations per week and 18.5 unvaccinated. Those are rates of 1 per million and 26.4 per million.

A vaccinated person in B is 7 times as likely to be hospitalized as a vaccinated person in A. For unvaccinated people, it is 6 times.

Note that in either state, vaccinated people are much better off than unvaccinated, both in terms of cases and hospitalizations. But in B, the state with the low vaccination rate, both vaccinated and unvaccinated people are quite a bit worse off than those in B, the state with the high vaccination rate.

[1] https://arstechnica.com/science/2021/08/pandemic-of-unvaccin...

Next thing you will say you should not need a driver license to drive a car because it limit your freedom?

if you have a medical condition precluding vaccination you should not go to indoor activity that are not essential. But i would love to be proven wrong about that.

Current vaccine only have 88% efficacy against variants! I still call this a significant risk given the 5% fatality rate.

I am pro vaccine and I am vaccinated - just explaining that I understand people's reluctance to believe anything they hear.

Both of those procedures are exceedingly personal medical decisions the ramifications of which will never spread beyond yourself or, at most, your immediate family. The question of vaccination isn't an individual decision - it's a societal decision. We all (or most, technically) get vaccinated so that we can curtail an ongoing pandemic, it isn't effective if done to only a small segment of the population and the US is currently sitting just short of 60% vaccinated with at least one dose.

The big difference is between it validly being a personal choice or being something necessary for society to function.

AFAIK these aren't public spaces

I’m half joking each time i see a comment like that I don’t understand what you think the government is trying to achieve by vaccinating you.

The only evil thing I can think of is some politicians would make more money if more people get vaccinated because they own shares of the company producing the vaccine.

But if that’s is the case nothing is stopping you to go ahead and also buy stock of pharma

This feels a touch melodramatic. I understand the point you want to make, but maybe a 1984 reference would work better. Vaccination is (barring some relatively uncommon exceptions) a choice, and not something that you have no control over.

Every gym I've ever been a member of requires you to validate your ID. You either swipe your membership card (which has your personal information tied to it), or provide your license to get into the gym. If you can't provide either, they aren't letting you in the door.

Every restaurant in the US is already supposed to validate your ID when you order an alcoholic drink. Bars won't even let you in the door without showing an ID.

I don't think anyone is happy this is required, but when people that are unvaccinated decide to put others at risk because they don't want to be inconvenienced, this is what happens.

A simple regulation could also make this safe from surveillance while still allowing verification:

Allow people to check identity, but make it illegal to store or share this information.

There are so many small, simple laws that could go long ways to protect people from surveillance while still allowing us to do new things to protect us. I wish we got 10% of the obvious laws many people want.

I've spent not more than a couple of weeks in total in the NY and during that time I was required to produce identification more times than I had in years spent in various continental European countries - where in theory you were obliged to carry Id with you at all times.

Just because I wanted to buy a beer or order wine with food in a bar or restaurant. I was in my late 20s at the time.

It's just what you're used to.