By David Skilling*
Across the developed world, Covid outcomes are generally improving. Cases have largely stabilised, and increasingly widespread vaccinations have substantially weakened the link between Covid cases and deaths.
This has allowed economies to open up over the past several months. With the aid of vaccination passports, for example, the European summer was close to normality. Q2 GDP results show a strong economic recovery. And some countries are now looking to the end of all restrictions as vaccination rates rise: Denmark has just lifted all Covid restrictions on >80% vaccination rates.
It’s a long road
But Israel’s experience shows that exiting Covid will be an ongoing process, with booster shots required and a stop/start process of restrictions. The finishing line for Covid keeps getting extended. Vaccination rates of 70% were initially thought to be sufficient, but the delta variant means that 80-90% is a more likely threshold – and even then elimination will not be possible.
The world will need to live with Covid for some time. A genuinely post-Covid world – where Covid is background noise – is not a near-term prospect for much of the world. This is a very different experience than the much less infectious, and less global, SARS virus in 2003, which was eliminated.
High frequency economic data and growth forecasts are softening due to the impact of delta, ongoing disruptions to supply chains, borders, and so on. The OECD’s Economic Outlook released on Tuesday marked down 2021 global GDP growth slightly from 5.8% to a still healthy 5.7%, with weaker forecast growth in the US offset by stronger Eurozone growth.
Indeed, there is substantial variation around the world. Europe is opening up much more quickly than much of Asia, for example. Several leading Asian countries – from China to Australia and New Zealand – are operating a version of elimination strategies, with lockdowns and closed borders still in effect. And many developing countries are suffering bad Covid outcomes and have limited access to vaccines.
This is leading to an uneven global recovery process, as well as major disruptions to global supply chains. Covid was importantly a supply side shock; and as demand picks up, many pressures are emerging across the global economy (from labour markets to inflation).
Captured by success
Previous small world notes have discussed reasons for variation in national performance on Covid: such as the winner’s curse (countries that do well for a time often under-perform subsequently, and vice versa); and the ‘varieties of capitalism’ approach to vaccinations (it was no great surprise that the UK and US led initially, but were then overtaken by the EU).
Another useful perspective is path dependence. Countries have tended to stick with their initial approaches to Covid management since early 2020, shaped by their historical experience and initial options.
Broadly speaking, Asian countries – from China to Singapore and New Zealand – adopted aggressive approaches to controlling (eliminating) Covid. This was partly because of their experience of SARS when similar measures were successfully rolled out. In the main, these approaches have been successful in controlling Covid cases and deaths – several Asian countries rank as world-leaders. And although there has been a cost to closed borders, many of these economies have generated strong economic outcomes.
In contrast, and again broadly speaking, European countries and the US acted on the basis that Covid could not be eliminated in their contexts (at least by the time they started to act). Lockdown measures (often quite aggressive) were introduced to manage pressure on health systems, but these measures were relaxed when the pressure eased. This meant a higher incidence of cases and deaths. Unsurprisingly, these countries have placed priority on rapid vaccinations.
Now what?
Reasonable people can disagree on which approach was preferable. But given where we are now – effective vaccines, but with endemic Covid more likely than elimination – the elimination approach does not seem sustainable. An approach focused on tight control or elimination of Covid cases implies that countries will have to close themselves off indefinitely – at an increasingly significant economic and social cost.
Europe offers a view on what a path to a post-Covid world could look like, with high vaccination rates, low Covid cases and deaths (relative to previous waves), economic and social reopening, and a strengthening economic recovery.
But in path dependent situations, it can be very hard to change approach even when the context changes. The public mood in many countries that have pursued aggressive Covid policies remains supportive – this approach is seen to have worked, there is reluctance to endanger this success, and political incentives still favour the status quo (for now).
This path dependence means that change will be a gradual process. And significant progress is required on vaccination rates in countries like Japan, Taiwan, Australia, and New Zealand, in order to confidently allow for opening up.
But note that Singapore is currently adapting its approach. Now that vaccination rates are high, it is making efforts to reopen domestically and across its borders while maintaining some measures to control Covid spread. Australia is also beginning to move away from elimination, with New Zealand more cautiously and implicitly moving in this direction as well.
The way in which this transition is managed matters for the countries involved. But the systemic importance of Asia to the world means that this transition will have broader effects on the global economy.
China’s borders are effectively closed to people movements, hindering engagement with the world’s second largest economy. It is striking that President Xi has not left China for over 600 days. And as Asia is still the factory of the world, as well as a major consumer, ongoing Covid restrictions or disruptions in these markets will have a global impact.
A broader risk is that sustained differences in approaches to Covid management will harden the fragmentation of the global economy, with a decoupling of China from other parts of the global economy. Announcements were made this week that vaccinated people can now travel between Europe and the US, but Asia remains largely closed.
A post-Covid world is gradually emerging, but it will not be a utopian zero-Covid world. Expectations – and policy approaches – will need to adjust to these realities.
*David Skilling ((@dskilling) is director at economic advisory firm Landfall Strategy Group. This article first ran here and is used with permission. Skilling recently spoke to interest.co.nz in a Zoom interview.
159 Comments
Several leading Asian countries – from China to Australia and New Zealand...
Used to be Oceania when I was at school?
The death rate is very difficult to compare, I think New Zealand and Australia will come out well ahead but given the virus will become endemic within human populations but has hardly normalised within ours yet the number are almost meaningless. The death rate in the England and Wales seems to have stabilised around 107 deaths/day from Covid-19 presently, for perspective that's slightly higher than the death rate from Influenza and Pneumonia in the same regions at 80 per day. Of course it could be far lower if we can get above the 67% fully vaccinated (73% partially vaccinated) that the UK is at. New Zealand appears to be at 64/35% first/second respectively so we're over the halfway mark to catching them.
Israel is a slightly strange case because they have many ultra-orthodox jews who have been very reluctant to be vaccinated and live in close quarters. It's difficult to draw direct comparisons to many other western countries.
Israel was one of the first countries to get vaccinated. NZ needs to learn from their experience that the Pfizer vaccine dramatically loses its effectiveness from getting infected from Covid-19 in about 6 months after getting fully vaccinated.
As an example people who were vaccinated in January 2021 only have about 16% protection from getting Covid-19 in July 2021. This is also known as the waning effect.
If they get infected, known as a breakthrough infection, they are just as contagious as an unvaccinated person. They may or may not have symptoms but are unlikely to get hospitalised. This is bad news because booster shots will be required if people want to remain protected from passing on the virus on to others.
It is inexcusable for Shaun Hendy’s modelling to ignore the effects of waning in his analysis on the impact it will have on NZ’s number of cases. The cases are extremely unlikely to get back to zero because of this problem. His analysis should have made a greater effort to emphasise that the government needs to address the now well-known waning effect of the Pfizer vaccine. This is why countries are ordering booster shots.
See last page of link below for graph showing waning effect depending on month you were vaccinated. (Link takes 30s to download)
I see your frustrations. Your arguments infer that there is a nuanced and complex perspective to be taken on Covid based on real world examples. Unfortunately we neither have the brightest nor best leading our response and their fascist-esque cheerleaders in the media and society demand myopic slavishness to the one true gospel of elimination.
Well. I have good news. 3 things can't be hidden for long. The sun, the moon, and breakthrough infections. At which point we will scrub our memories of the last 18 months and get down to the business of fighting over the handful of ICU beds available.
And being mostly unable to self reflect, we will adopt the dark ages mentality to healthcare: "the Mercury didn't kill him, he was going to die anyway."
This is Nature's way of punishing the cowardice in us.
“ Unfortunately we neither have the brightest nor best leading our response and their fascist-esque cheerleaders in the media and society demand myopic slavishness to the one true gospel of elimination”
What? Herald and Stuff today and everyday are choka with anti government response commentators.
Therefore, as is the case in the UK, surely it will be essential to be able to self test, saliva test, at home if symptoms arrive. Early intervention and treatment must help alleviate the likelihood of hospitalisation. Where are the governments plans for this then? Still in the too hard basket undoubtedly!
You are sort of correct. In that if NZ drops the elimination approach it will make little difference between 80 & 90% vaccinated. Several thousand will die & thats that.
However Shaun Hendy's model assumed NZ could retain the elimination approach with 90% vaccinated as 90% vaccination would see the R value of Covid drop to a point that combined with other measures (level 2.5 restrictions), scanning, masks every where & excellent contact tracing. We could stamp our any outbreaks as they arise. This is ultimately based on the assumption that vaccination reduces infection by 70%.
Shaun Heady's Covid elimination utopia seams like a hell hole to me personally but hey each to their own.
Yes, and the false narrative would have you believe it is unvaccinated that pose the greatest risk and therefore they could be excluded from entering buildings etc.
Yet it is really people once vaccinated who acting as though they are free of the ability to be infected and pass on infection and that they are free to act as per the old normal that pose an even greater risk of infecting others.
Not that this is a problem if we agree that Covid is here to stay, BUT that the vaccinated expect all their freedoms to be restored, after all, that is what they were promised by Govt, for enduring the lockdowns and vaccinations.
Many see there is a personal cost to being vaccinated and that it should give them a privilege over the non vaccinated. If this differential is not great enough by being vaccinated, then the only way to create it is to add a penalty for not being vaccinated. The fact that not being vaccinated adds a higher risk of death to that individual should they catch it, is not enough for many of the vaccinated.
Yes, the sickest part of this is the anger, hatred and smugness developing amongst vaccinated toward the unvaccinated. It would not be considered acceptable in any other part of society.
The government has to bear its share of the blame for this via their messaging. They should reflect that based on the stats so far, it's young maori who are least likely to be vaccinated at the moment. They risk enforcing underclass status on their own favorite demographic.
Maybe we could make them wear a yellow star in public? Then we could beat them, and seize all their property because they're responsible for all the money Labour wasted.
No seriously- I've already had covid thank you, and I don’t want the vaccine! The thought of a compulsory injection with an experimental agent that transfects my cells to make some cytotoxic protein makes me FU*king furious. This is the biggest travesty here. They’re passing off natural immunity as vaccinated immunity. There's virtually no way to prove that you've had covid because the immunoglobulins decay so quickly.
The groupthink around this is so pervasive isn't it. For anyone interested check out "the Asch experiment" to see how groupthink works. An example is the author of this article stating that vaccines are the reason Europe is doing well, and therefore we need vaccine passports. - No! Natural immunity and recovered immunity likely play a dominant role. How does one justify Sweden doing so much better that Israel? Natural immunity is superior to vaccinated immunity which is also why it's such a bad idea to be vaccinating young healthy people who's risk from covid is virtually zero.
If you want a reference, you need to look at Singapore instead. They have well a defined roadmap, a prepared healthcare system, a high vaccination rate (82%) with some restrictions in place incl. some level of border controls. Singapore MOH offers comprehensive daily media releases, and you can have a holistic view of how things progress.
Israel may be the trailblazer last year, but they are no more.
I was impressed by the quotes from the Singapore medical authorities published in a comment yesterday - they explained each death without identifying the individual but gave their age, vaccination details, other health conditions, when they fell ill, when they went to hospital, date of death, etc. From this type of data an informed person can estimate their risk and judge whether mask wearing, vaccination, lockdowns should be enforced, persuaded or ignored.
It is important to judge whether a death or severe illness is caused by Covid-19 or just made worse or completely irrelevant. I have read that deaths judged to be from flu are only one tenth of the numbers where people died while they had flu.
There's a lot of benefits to having everyone vaccinated, even if they are at low risk of serious illness. The lower the amount of Covid circulating the better, to protect the vulnerable and those who can't be vaccinated and reduce the strain on the hospital system and allow restrictions to be eased.
Your comment only has validity in an environment where meaningful risk analysis has been crushed under the jackboot of government mandated scientific discourse.
Firstly the vaccines do not confer sterilizing immunity.
Secondly those who are vaccinated and are infected are found to have similar viral loads.
Thirdly there is no good science indicating reduced transmissibility. This is not a claim from Pfizer anyhow. And their studies didn't even test for it.
Fourthly, efficacy wanes. Tell Hendy. His models don't factor that in.
Fifthly let's celebrate 1000 of 1200 people recovered so far without any help from the Ministry. Left to rot in MIQ without even a mention of Vitamin D or Zinc. Just a good luck mate hope you don't become another statistic.
And finally, if we are to stigmatize the unvaccinated, we should equally get back to fat shaming, because obesity is a leading comorbidity causing complications during Covid infection.
I'm happy with fat shaming - make them pay for 2 seats on a plane -(I'm 105kg) and with smoking shaming (pls get two of my children to stop) and with unvaccinated shaming (keep them in lockdown). They emphasize shaming smokers at our schools; they should do the same for obesity - make the entire school go running until the average BMI is less than some specific figure. Just as rates of smoking are declining so should fatness. It took too long for our govt to take on the strong tobacco lobby; now they should take on the addictive fast-foods.
But how will get those with people with comorbidities like obesity to get vaccinated if we can't motivate them with a bacon butty or KFC?
Or if that is all it took, maybe we could motivate all people to keep healthy that if they sign up to WeightWatchers we will give them a year's free supply of KFC.
From the modelling report:
There is still a high degree of uncertainty about the effectiveness of vaccines against the Delta variant, particularly for breakthrough infection and subsequent propensity to transmit. Furthermore immunity may wane over time. Our central vaccine effectiveness against infection and severe illness is comparable to that reported by Public Health England on 17 September 2021 for the Delta variant [7].
I have been following their numbers for two weeks. My takeaways from their numbers:
- Non-vaccinated people have a greater chance to get severely sick, go to ICU or die, about 3 times higher than fully vaccinated.
- Fully vaccinated senior citizens (60+) are still at risk of being hospitalised. More than 50% of hospitalisation is from this age group.
- About 10% of hospitalised were children between 0 and 11 yo
The resurgence in Israel and Singapore is example of the virus mutating to survive.
The more vaccinated, the more variants will evolve. The good thing is each variant is less harmful than the previous but more infectious as it strives to survive.
The vaccines themselves are providing a trojan for variants which is why those case numbers in Israel and Singapore are almost exclusively vaccinated people.
We need someone like Sir John Key running the country. He wrote an excellent article in NZ Herald today.
John’s experience & understanding of what an economy can afford is needed at this time because NZ needs to transition quickly to prepare its defences for a suppression strategy.
Unless more people like John speak out, change will continue at a snail’s pace & this will have significant health & financial consequences for NZ over the next decade.
Covid 19 Delta outbreak: Sir John Key - 5 ideas to transform our approach
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12474505
Yep, and I particularly like the suggestion to pick a date to open up - as it 'might' incentivise people to be vaccinated.
I have no doubt that it bloody well will incentivise people to be vaccinated.
The reason: Every pundit and their cat seems to be treating the modelling report as if we get to x% vax and then vaccinations stop dead. Therefore we get y deaths.
Surely it isn't too much of a leap to understand that vaccinations will continue at a rapid rate. So if we opened up at 80%, the dial would quickly move to 85%. Then likely more slowly to 90%.
How many deaths result from the scenario? Or do we all have wait for 90% because the leadership didn't think of that, and no-one thought to ask?
I've been following the Bloomberg vaccine tracker since late summer and, without fail, once the numbers hit the upper levels of those who want to get vaccinated in any country, the daily rates drop off quickly.
I don't think New Zealand will be any different.
https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/covid-vaccine-tracker-global-distrib…
I only hope we approve vaccines for children before we shrug our shoulders and "get on with this".
Just in case you are going to read something remotely challenging your belief that children are actually at risk, here is an excellent source of unbiased, calm and rational assessment of scientific information available. Not just relating to Covid either.
https://sebastianrushworth.com/2021/09/23/a-reflection-on-covid-mania/
Yes Yes and Yes! It seems to me that NZ is the epicenter of that covid hysteria.
I'd add that when he says “prior infection provides a level of protection to new infection that is at least as good as that provided by vaccination" He refers to an article he wrote on the 24 April 2021. The scientific understanding has changed now. Prior infection provides a superior level of protection compared to vaccination. This has unequivocally been shown in the science article published later in the year on the 13th August 2021. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.abh1766
He thinks $25 will make a difference? John Key's big plan is tiny financial incentives. Most of the unvaxed have made the choice rather than being too lazy and he thinks an hours pay in giftcard form from make any difference (the vax buses are better than this). When this patronizing plan fails he falls back on a marginally different set of coercion methods than the current government.
The other idea is to implement Seymour's (that's the most interesting part of article he mentions ACT but not National) MIQ plan which will be leaky enough that it will be the end of elimination. I read the whole thing as asking the country to be in permanent level 2 or above (like Singapore) so the rich can be guaranteed MIQ spots to get back in.
That would at least be significant but idea of direct financial benefit is just bad in many ways unless you are onboard with compulsion.
First if your all of a sudden getting 500 for vaxing why did those before this get nothing and then the unvaxed ask themselves if they hold off for longer do they get more. Then maybe you hand out 500 for everyone (to make it fair) who has ever got vaxed and you have a large tax burden to pay for this on the unvaxed some of whom can't get it.
Nothing good can come from this it needs to be personal choice, except if you want authoritarianism and then why pay at all, just round everyone up (there are misinformed scared people who are ok with this already).
Those who have medical proof that they cannot be vaccinated get the $500 as does everyone carrying an Vaccination card. I am onboard for compulsion. For example my two grandsons - one is 13 and will return to school and the other is under 2 and therefore not approved for vaccination and therefore he is at risk from Covid-19 (very unlikely to die but could be seriously ill). When the older child goes to school I want him vaccinated but I also want all the other school pupils to be vaccinated. USA, the land of the free, requires measles vaccination to enter a public school - we should do the same for our schools but with Covid-19 vaccination. Yes, it is an imposition that overrules personal choice but similar rules are accepted for drinking and driving, smoking in a public building, wearing seatbelts and even one I hate - wearing a cycle helmet.
Other than having a much higher failure rate (vaccinated person becoming infected) in what way is it different? Maybe Covid-19 mutates much faster than Measles?
I'm not saying forcible injections against your will or medical advice but I am saying no entry to supermarkets, gyms, schools, shops, public events if any vaccinated person is present. The rules against smoking are tougher - they do not open supermarkets, gyms or pubs for smoking sessions.
It is by default a ‘by force’ vaccination if you make it compulsory in schools and other essential areas of life. I know that I certainly would participate in legal challenges to your, or anyone ele’s suggested curtailing of a basic human right. That is to be able to refuse a medical procedure. And as far as I know, NZ schools do not have a mandatory vaccination for other dideases now either. Also, your comparison of cycle helmets (and other examples) is really hillarious. Those rules do not require you to inject some early trial stage new dna technology for which they had to even change definitions of ‘vaccine’… It is seriously scary how easily we have the vaccine police developing in NZ. Not a single rational or democratic thought given whatsoever. Purely, me, I Want, I demand… based on mainstream media and disingenious goverment pushed selective information!
As I keep repeating, I am vaccinated for Polio and some other things, so is my 12 year old daughter! But for heavens sake, can we stop making this a war on ‘those-refusing-to-be-fear-mongered’…? As some others have tried to point out too, nothing good will come from persecuting peoplecfor insisting on their basic human right! I would suggest to stop trying to prevent a healthy, robust scientific debate before advocating an injection so unproven for medium to long term safety mandatory!!
So how do Americans justify compulsory vaccination in public schools? Not the land of the free?
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2553651/
For decades, all 50 states have required that parents vaccinate their children against various diseases, including polio and measles, as a prerequisite to enrolling them in public schools. While virtually all states have tailored their immunization statutes to exempt those with religious (and sometimes philosophical) objections to vaccines from these requirements, widespread use of these exemptions threatens to undermine many of the benefits of mandatory vaccinations, such as preserving “herd immunity”.
Your point about the mRNA vaccines being an 'early stage trial' is no longer true. The Pfizer vaccine is not early stage after a billion jabs and it has now been approved by responsible medical authorities. Your argument was good earlier this year but not now. i will concur with your view about democracy - lets vote to make everyone vaccinated - it is much the same as enforcing a universal rule of forcing everyone to drive on the left. Of course you have a choice - just don't drive and if not vaccinated do not socialise.
It's not the number of jabs that measures the safety of whatever is injected into you, but the length of time necessary to collect reliable data on outcomes which has always been around 8 years.
So after only a year, these substances and whatever technology is carried in them is still very much experimental according to historical benchmarks.
Measles is not a respiratory illness so comparing apples with oranges.
It used to be we encouraged measles and chicken pox infections as natural immunity is known to be better.
When did the belief in synthetic fixes take over education and knowledge that the human body is an amazingly designed "technology"?
This whole thing is like a mass manipulation event. Fuel mass hysteria and increase the governance of others.
The one thing governments and corporations despise is self governance.
I didn't have any fear of those diseases or of dying from them and I had them all except polio. Never feared the flu either. I didn't fear for my son when he caught chicken pox either.
Why don't we have the same response to all the other preventable deaths? Where are the sacrifices for the greater good for all the other issues we face today?
The greater good story is just self serving BS. This isn't about the fear of others dying or being harmed. This is fear of one's own mortality. And through that fear you've doubled down on govts and big pharma to govern your health.
Why is there such a massive resolve by WHO and other institutions to create the fear of "pandemics"?
If we really cared about our children's health and wellbeing why are we not creating a healthier environment for them to be raised in?
Raising our children in fear is not the answer.
The chance of a healthy child or adolescent having a serious outcome from covid is roughly similar to a recently vaxed and healthy 30 to 40 year old and absolutely tiny compared to you your own (being a grandparent). It's less than a 1 in 100,000 mortality rate for the age group, they have other things to worry about. We are talking about probably 8 deaths with every child exposed and that's before we factor in vax side effects. (Everyone is more than welcome to check my maths and statistics). They are going to learn to drive and get their own cars in few years.
I think we need to harden up and stop worrying about under 40 vaccination rates of healthy people. Give them an opportunity and make every effort to continue to offer one and carry on. The deaths here will barely register against other causes, they can have personal choice. Pfizer will not stop the spread which is where the argument for vaxing the young came from. Group 2 vaccines wearing off is a far bigger concern.
I've not checked if there is data for our current outbreak. 1000 people infected including 200 children does give a reasonable sample. I expect all have recovered and none died. How many children passed on their infection to the four patients in ICU I don't know.
Many years ago I had a young child catch flu - never hospitalised, recovered in a day or two but I have never been so worried about a health issue in my life and that includes my wife's cancer and my mild heart attack. Covid is reputed to be worse than flu so I hope my grandchildren (13,4 and 2) never get it.
From govt website and detailing all cases since beginning of pandemic - COVID-19 cases by age group
Age 0-9 8.9%
Age 10-19 12.5%
with 88 current cases (age 0-19) out of 225 total current cases. Seems high to me.
John Key's suggestion of a $25 reward is contemptuous. Here's something much more expensive but useful: the prize for vaccination a cheap smartphone with the mandated Covid passport preloaded, and universal free internet so that no one has an excuse not to sign in with it whenever they enter a place open to the public.
I like the idea of putting a date on it.
It won't happen though because that would require the government to commit to something that they can't easily back out of (and I suspect any political party would be inclined to do the same).
I think that having a firm goal for dropping any potential domestic restrictions would be good as well. For example, the media has been abuzz recently with talk of a domestic vaccine passport.
What's the end goal here?
Will we still be scanning in to get a coffee or have our hair cut in 20 years time? It might suit some of the loony hypochondriacs out there (particularly those who frequent Reddit's New Zealand section, which is always good for a laugh ... in a depressing way) but that seems a miserable way to live.
If a domestic vaccine passport is introduced, then IMO there needs to be clear and unequivocal criteria to phase it out as well - like we are seeing in countries such as Denmark and Norway.
I thought it was rubbish. Pretty easy to come up with ideas when you are not responsible for their effects. And then the typical “we have to open up for the economy” crap even though we were doing pretty bloody well without it (until we opened the trans Tasman which caused this lockdown).
He is right that we can’t keep locking down forever, I think the government acknowledge that. But the current approach of getting vax rates up first and then gradually changing the rules makes sense, particularly as other countries are currently doing that and will give us insight into what will work.
Oh, the irony. Here is Sir John Key, on what he would do to make housing more affordable if he was elected PM:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWPgoAI1cLE
And before he was a Sir which he was the main driving force to restore these honours and was one of the first recipients.
While there may be some merit in some of his points, he and National by default would be the last person/s to actually implement them if in charge.
In fact, based on what he said and then didn't do with housing, you would expect him to do the exact opposite of what he said.
John Key was a total failure as PM. He did nothing to sort out poverty and housing. Having so much wealth divorced him from real life. Becoming PM was just to get another part of his bucket list sorted. He had no intention of leaving NZ better off after his tenure asPM. In saying that Jacinda is no better. She will not do anything that rocks central NZ. Hence no capital gains tax, no super changes, no rocking of housing prices. Even not helping the poor. They both love the feel of power and will only let it go when they move onto the next item on their bucket list. When will we get a 100 per cent sincere political leader who looks after all sectors of society. Has such a person ever existed.
Maori has the lowest vaccination rate atm. The government will need to work much harder to get that improved. I don't think what JK suggested was enough. I reckon it will be a shitshow if we open up without a sufficient vaccination rate in our fellow Maori and Pacific populations.
People who decline the vaccine should have to pay for their future hospital care. Make it like a student loan if you wish and they slowly pay it down. Too much grandstanding on social media based on the idea that the consequences to them are inconsequential and to hell with the consequences to others.
I suspect health insurers will start to question your vaccine status when your cover gets priced up too.
People who .... should have to pay for the own healthcare.
- Drink
- Smoke
- overeat
- drive recklessly
- own a firearm
- Do extreme sports
- don't get
- Flu vaccine
- MMR vaccine
- xxx vacine
The compulsory covid vaccine is a slippery slope that would fundamentally change the current system we operate under. Should we just move to the USA solution of user pays for everything?
Nktokyo
Only if cocaine and P users who OD pay for theirs to? What about the right to sue Pfizer if the vaccine damages you?
Although the vaccine death rate is low and rare. I predict when covid runs rampant in nz with 85 percent vac rate. The unvaccinated will be blamed and abused like animals.
A friend who has a medium sized business is pushing his unvaxxed employees to get the jab because he can see friction between workers if vaxxed have to work alongside unvaxxed.
A few have responded that if in the very unlikely event the vax damages them and they wind up living on the sickness benefit, would the employer make up the lost income? Looks like a minefield to me.
In the massively unlikely event of a vaccine injury, the wages of the person would be covered by ACC.
It's many, many, many times more likely someone would die from Covid or be disabled by long Covid.
Considering unvaccinated people are 5 times more likely to get infected than vaccinated and remain infectious for longer it would be negligent to let unvaccinated people work in a space shared by others, especially if any of them were elderly or had health conditions.
In the massively unlikely event of a vaccine injury, the wages of the person would be covered by ACC.
Unlikey, ACC cover accidents, not illnesses. i.e. loss of function in an arm is probably covered. Heart defect would not.
It's many, many, many times more likely someone would die from Covid or be disabled by long Covid.
Probable for over 60s, possible for over 40s, plausable for over 20s, unlikely for under 20s.
Considering unvaccinated people are 5 times more likely to get infected than vaccinated and remain infectious for longer it would be negligent to let unvaccinated people work in a space shared by others, especially if any of them were elderly or had health conditions.
Think wider than Covid.
I have been vaccinated for a range of things over and above the regular NZ immunisation schedule. Do I therefore have the right to feel unsafe due to all the people with only the bare minimum? or the people who didn't get x vaccine due to their age (Hands up how many adults have had the Chicken pox vaccine?, whooping cough? flu?) or the people that are legitamitely unable to have x, y, z vaccine due to allergies, liklihood of other adverse reactions.
No one batted at the 2019 measle outbreak in NZ (https://www.health.govt.nz/about-ministry/information-releases/general-…). So why is Covid scarier? given it is less infectious, leads to less hospitalisation, and has a mortality rate that is significantly lower for <20s.
ACC can provide treatment and support for injuries caused by COVID-19 vaccination if the criteria for treatment injury are met. This means there’s a physical injury caused by the vaccination, that’s not a necessary part or ordinary consequence of the treatment.
For example, inflammation around the site of the injection is common with COVID-19 vaccination (an ordinary consequence) and is unlikely to be covered. Infections (such as cellulitis or septic arthritis) due to the vaccination, and anaphylaxis resulting in injury, are not ordinary consequences and are likely to be covered.
Interestingly, catching Covid at work is also covered, and they've paid out to healthcare workers. Some OSH prosecutions coming up if they let people work in high risk situations without vaccination?
Where is your source which shows unvaccinated people are 5 times more likely to get infected than vaccinated?
If this were true the vaccine would provide a constant 80% protection (ie 20% not protected) from getting infected with Covid-19 compared to an unvaccinated person which has no protection
The link below suggests that the amount of protection from infection depends on how long ago you got vaccinated. The vaccine appears to have a significant waning effect over time.
The data from Israel suggests that the vaccine only provides 16% protection from getting infected with Covid if you were fully vaccinated 6 months prior to getting infected.
See last page of link below for graph showing waning effect depending on month you were vaccinated. (Link takes 30s to download)
Also if an employer requires vaccination in the workplace as a means to reduce the risk of Covid transmission (in-keeping with health and safety guidelines) then surely they are de facto accepting responsibility for the transmission of any 'airborne' virus/disease/illness.
I asked an employment lawyer about this, who said to me that in the past employers have not been able to be held responsible for the transmission of colds, flus etc in the workplace.
Why should Covid be any different? And if it has to be different, then why shouldn't employers also be responsible for preventing the transmission of any other illness in the workplace?
Is there a potential can of worms being opened here?
So what? Once everyone is vaccinated, all that happens is the lunatics have bullet proof vests as well, and their guns have slightly less ammo.
The interesting thing about this pandemic, is not the virus, or the response. It is the psychology , in particular the way fear is making people react.
The reality is... The vaccine is not a bullet proof vest, more of an armored car. The lunatic bit, well that is fair enough. Yes, they are spraying bullets all over the show and some will hit the car, but you are at little to no risk of being hit. So you don't need to be that scared.
I should add, it is all about relative risk.
As it stands, anywhere in the world, you have a 2.9% chance of catching Covid, and if you do, a 2% chance of dying from it (so a 0.059% chance of dying from Covid on any given day).
With the vaccine, your odds go to about 0.12% chance of catching Covid, and about a <0.002% chance of dying on any given day.
Based on total cases, total global population, and rough vaccine effectiveness of 96%. Results may vary depending on individual measures/precautions taken, genetics, and current health.
Because an unvaccinated person is much more likely to be shedding the virus. For a healthy vaccinated 40 year old, maybe that's no big deal. But for someone 80 plus, or immunocompromised, or too young to be vaccinated it's highly significant.
I'm not willing to share a bus with unvaccinated people, or eat in the same restaurant, or have them teaching my kids, and certainly not going to have them cutting my hair or cleaning my teeth. Why should I expose myself to that risk.
That's simply incorrect at a population level. The vast majority of people in daily life you encounter will be vaccinated. If they have the virus, it is much more likely to be mild or asymptomatic - in other words they will be out and about living their lives normally, dramatically increasing the chances of them spreading it. The fact that they have a smaller viral load on average doesn't diminish the weight of numbers from those thousands more interactions you have.
Meanwhile the unvaccinated person is more likely to be laid up at home in bed not spreading the bug in public. Or dead, if you're still under the impression that it's that bad.
So you agree that vaccinated people can not only still get infected but can also spread the virus, from anyone that is infected whether they be a vaccinated person or not. And if they do, who are they most risking? Less so the already vaccinated, but more so the unvaccinated, which if the unvaccinated what to carry that risk, that is up to them as individuals.
And the argument that this might overload our hospital system is a strawman argument in the context of this discussion because the vaccinated are acting as though the unvaccinated are a threat to them personally.
Our health system was not even catering for our needs pre Covid, let alone now and post Covid.
Also what everyone has overlooked, is that the whole concept of herd immunity is once you get to 80 to 90% of mass immunization, which could be a combination of vaccination and natural caught immunity, then you don't have to worry about the rest who are not immunized for whatever reason.
Now we are suddenly saying these unimmunized people are a threat to everyone else?
The only logic for saying this is in the context of having an elimination policy, ie no spreading Covid, and also the realization that vaccination does not provide you the protection they are been telling everyone it does.
What is really starting to annoy vaccinated people, is the realization that the sacrifice they have made by getting vaccinated (most people have begrudgingly gotten vaccinated), and the financial and emotional sacrifices, are not giving them the advantage that Govt. told them they would. If they can't get this advantage, they want a differential made between them and the unvaccinated, ie punish the unvaccinated, to give the appearance of an advantage.
And what is really annoying is that at the end of most people being vaccinated, including the most vulnerable, then when Covid does come through the country when we finally rejoin the world, then there will be a small select group of unvaccinated people who will catch Covid, without any great drama, and be natural immunized and better protected that all the rest of us that got vaccinated.
Hardly sounds fair, does it?
Can an employer ask if an applicant is fully vaccinated against Covid-19 when interviewing? Given the possibility of long-Covid, workplace transmission or time needed off work of they contract the disease it might be an important disclosure in swaying their hiring decision even as we head towards the tail end of this pandemic.
I went out for dinner recently with the extended family.
A few of my family members are rather large, to be diplomatic and polite (dangerously obese would be a better term).
One in particular is awaiting a publicly-funded gastric bypass. She is also on publicly-funded medication and treatments for a variety of other conditions brought on by her obesity.
At this dinner, she proceeded to eat an entree for two, the biggest main on the menu, dessert, and polish off a few glasses of wine.
While I am very fond of this family member, following your logic why should the healthy and athletic young couple who were sat on the table next to us, tucking in to their salads and soda waters, have to contribute via their taxes to pay for her medical care? Her condition is entirely self-induced, over years of built up bodily neglect.
In fact, I'd argue that the public health system supporting the overweight and unfit is far more outrageous than supporting those who choose not to get vaccinated. You can lose weight and get fit at zero cost to yourself and the public purse (I presume Pfizer don't supply the shots for free, whereas it costs nothing to go for a walk, and you actually save money by eating less).
While Covid poses a greater acute risk to the health system, imagine how much less pressure there would be on the health system if we weren't constantly treating "self-inflicted" conditions of the excess adipose origin (or anything else that could be avoided by taking more responsibility and care for one's health).
Taking your reasoning a step further, even if someone is vaccinated against Covid and presents for hospitalisation anyway, why shouldn't we look at other lifestyle factors that might make their condition worse?
Or we just accept that our public health system is for the use of everybody, even though much of its effort is probably put towards treating those who could have treated themselves (whether through eating less, or smoking less, or not engaging in risky behaviour).
Go get vaccinated, because it's clearly the right thing to do for your health and for the benefit of the community - I'm headed in next week for my first (although I must admit that the insufferable and aggressive nature of some the ardently pro-vax crowd is rather off-putting) but don't pretend that being vaccinated makes you the patron saint of perfect health and wellbeing.
We could all do with taking better care of ourselves, and taking better care of the community by extension!
You forget that many people who are overweight and made stupid life choices to smoke and develop other addictions would also be the least able to pay for healthcare.
As others have said, it's just too slippery a slope to start loading costs on such people or for accidents or any number of bad luck issues that can occur to anyone at anytime.
Here is why lockdowne wont work any more. You can only enforce them by using the machinery of a police state. Kiwis will not accept that any longer. We were cynically manipulated from a 2 week lockdown to a month and a half. People have now been reminded of what tranche tactics are and will resist any future attemps to use them, especially by Labour who are still under the Clarke playbook spell. Get vaccinated. Well said John, but you need to put up some better candidates and policies before National can fully convert the floating voter.
Somebloke
Have to disagree, Kiwis love Labour and would embrace a totalitarian papers please society so long as Jacinda inforces it.
Since lockdown every Authoritarian that has been dorment has been surfaced. I've not seen so many kiwis get off on telling society what to do. If national tried passing a police state it would be opposed though.
Sort of - but in the end, this kind of thing can only go on in a society where the state is willing to liberally apply lethal force to suppress dissent. That's one of the advantages of our democracy.
There will simply be a point as more and more people start ignoring the rules, more and more people start questioning the permanent suspension of normal society...it will all become farcical and the whole thing will be dropped.
A couple of decades further on, this period will be studied as a historical oddity and curiosity.
We were not manipulated, it was always going to happen. I predicted Auckland would be in level 4 until 1st October way back. Well your in level 3 now and will be on the 1st October so its hardly changed apart from you can now queue for hours for your KFC. You simply cannot tell people they will be in 2 months of level 3 or 4 lockdown it would fail from the very first day because people would say screw that. What you do is dangle a carrot out every 2 weeks and hope the majority follow it.
Auckland in the middle of 2 weeks level 3. If the government think they can get away with another week they will. Probably the status is not going to change that much over the next 10 days so that gives them enough of an excuse and more time to do nothing about what happens next. Sort of indicating on that basis level 3 forever isn’t it at this stage then as the government would like to see it. My guess is that they will creep in a level 2.75 when they have to.
Yes John Key was right about the "hermit kingdom" comment. My worry is that our PM will panic when vaccine effectiveness wears off - as Israeli data shows will happen. In that country 85% of hospitalised are double vaxxed.
The FDA has decided, however last week, that Pfizer boosters are too dangerous for under 65's - due to high levels of myocarditis amongst young males, so we cannot use boosters. If she goes back to Level 4 lockdowns this country will revolt.
What a load of rubbish sunchap, similar to the rest of the misinformation being peddled in this thread. The FDA has approved boosters for the over 65's, people at high risk under 65 (decided by their doctor) and people in high risk occupations and environments including healthcare workers, teachers and day care staff, grocery workers and those in homeless shelters or prisons. Nothing to do with myocarditis.
The reason is that the data from Israel shows a drop off in protection for the elderly, not seen in younger people as yet. As more data becomes available, the recommendations will evolve.
Here is a link to some reasoned assessments by someone likely more qualified and in a better position than many, if not most of us here:
https://sebastianrushworth.com/2021/09/23/a-reflection-on-covid-mania/
You are pushing misinformation.
The proportion of vaccinated people in Israel who are hospitalised is much lower than the proportion of unvaccinated people hospitalised. The same in the UK, USA, etc.
If vaccinated you are some 94% less likely to get a severe disease with covid that an unvaccinated person.
And the FDA did not decide Pfizer boosters were too dangerous for under 65s. It decided it needs more data to decide either way.
I wonder whether John Key could be coaxed back into politics??
He's in top form right now...... Would certainly give Judith Collins a run for her money...... And I daresay Jacinda as well.
TTP - anyone would do better than Collins, even Bridges isn't looking that bad any more.
Stuff going in to bat for expats overseas who have lived for over a decade in other countries and now 'want to come home'.
If you've lived somewhere else for ten years, NZ is no longer 'your home'.
There's also a huge degree of tone-deafness from Kiwis overseas, who fail to appreciate the how difficult life in NZ has become for the people who actually live here and pay the taxes to finance the state they're so keen to return to, and the arrogance that we should be falling over ourselves with gratitude when they decide to return, like we're incapable of functioning without them.
At the top of all this is the idiotic notion that someone's right to return to the state trumps the rights of Kiwis who actually live here to not be exposed to needless risk of lockdowns, economic ruin and the risk of re-importing deadlier strains during a global pandemic. With all due respect, we're the ones who have made the enormous economic sacrifice here, not you.
Yup, and we're being provided with deliberately extreme suggestions of it. There's a huge difference between someone who popped over to Oz during the trans-Tasman bubble and someone who moved permanently over there over a decade ago. Guess which ones we're hearing more about.
Really sad state of affairs, isn’t it? And here we have countries like Norway dropping all restrictions with 67% vaccination rate. And a neighbouring country that may soon be looked at as the real model for how to best deal with Covid or similar… Just to try and challenge some people’s thinking here, another good article on assessment of scientific studies:
https://sebastianrushworth.com/2020/09/25/how-to-understand-scientific-…
Fat Pat Denmark is definitely not a normal society......it is an abnormal society in the sense that it is the most civilized society in the world. The eminent Japanese/American political scientist, Francis Fukuyama, wrote a book called "Towards Denmark" in which he espouses all the ways Demark is superior, and that all countries should follow their example. In the 1950s it was common for many NZers to name Denmark as the country that they would like NZ to model itself on.
A good article. We cannot predict the future - by Xmas we will know how many refuse to be vaccinated but what we will not know is if a new variant is about to appear (ref a year ago children didn't get Covid-19) nor how the vaccination might be improved (the mRNA vaccine can be adjusted very quickly unlike all previous vaccines).
Still it is worth starting the discussion because of political inertia - who would want to be the politician who opens the border when some time later the first Covid deaths occur?
That puts in perspective for the under 60s (about 5% of covid deaths) you are more likely to die from a road crash. Does anyone worry daily about dying in a road crash?
Voluntary quarantining of retirees is a really shitty idea but there are worse ideas being floated. The only other way to keep them safe is to lock everyone down or maintain elimination.
https://i.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/opinion/300414808/sir-john-key-…
"We need to stop living in a hermit kingdom and being ruled by fear"
Brilliant !!!
Good politics really. Labour is putting itself in a corner by flogging the "elimination horse" till the bitter end. Looks like National is poised to become the "open up" political party. Should make make for some interesting politics. Everyone I know seams to believe that the vaccination is the end game for covid, in that once we are vaccinated the border will open & life will return to normal. I expect their will be a degree of resentment towards the current govt when they realise the current govt intends to persue an elimination strategy post vaccination.
This will be like the Aussie travel bubble. National will push too soon and we will end up paying the price.
John Key just sounds tired. Maybe the stress of all the bank lending is starting to weigh on him....can’t sleep for worrying about Evergrande and dealing with a housing crash whilst chair of the biggest bank.
National seems only capable of criticising the government but offer no long term vision. I heard Judith on the tv this morning. Worried about not bringing in the nurses and doctors we need from overseas.... more likely worried about keeping our immigration ponzi economy from stalling.
Maybe someone will realise that training all these overseas students leaves us short of locally skilled people to do the job.
Maybe NZ should be bringing back scholarships and training many more Maori and Pasifica doctors and nurses... thousands more...so in five or ten years we have a more resilient health care system.
countries overseas are realising that opening the boarders so one thing.... getting people to come back is another. the Uk is struggling for truck drivers...all our industries that have become reliant on overseas labour will struggle too. Time to train the young and build a better future I say.
National.... back to the future. Housing ponzis and unmanageable immigration....no thanks John
I don’t disagree.... but to a degree
it is an outcome of the system our MPs work in.
it still leaves me with the choice of who to vote for
the idiots who created the mess and refuse to acknowledge or fix it
or the idiots who recognised it and tried to fix it and couldn’t
still two years to go
18 new cases in Auckland today. They should still be in Level 4. Talk to any police officer and they all say once you move to Level 3 a lot of people just treat it as Level 1. Auckland to move back to Level 4 if things do not improve. Too many idiots not wanting to get vaccinated is creating a perfect storm.
Piss off.
Many many people here, including myself, are really struggling mentally with this now, it's about time to move on and live with this thing, with sensible precautions.
One more week at level 4, then no more.
One more week and we should be nudging over 80% vaccination , we can aspire to get higher, but not be ruled by that aspiration.
We are going to be forced to open up. Some people will die, its a fact of life but you cannot put the lives of 5 million on hold any longer. Summer is coming and there is simply no way people are going to stay shut away indoors. I'm not saying fling the immigration doors wide open, the MIQ needs to stay in effect because we need the MAXIMUM warning time for any new strains that eventuate to buy us time.
Vaccine efficacy is in fact now negative, ie the countries with higher vaccination rates have higher rates of hospitalisation eg Singapore and Israel: https://youtu.be/gqVfrKR_tDc.
But of course, facts do not matter to our PM or the DG of Health. We are living in a post truth society. Lock downs and masks to stop respiratory virus epidemics are also farcical stupidity and have been for 500 years. We are now the laughing stock of the world.
That video referenced by sunchap is over simplistic nonsense. If you drill further into the data you see that a greater proportion of unvaccinated people are dying from Covid.
"Israel's Unvaccinated 17% Now Account for Nearly Half of COVID Deaths"
https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/covid-israel-unvaccinated-17-nearly…
No, it's called science. Why did the FDA expert panel vote 16-2 to restrict the Pfizer vaccine as a booster to over 65's? You only restrict a vaccine if the danger of taking exceeds the chance of Covid death.
Eight hours of video testimony are on YouTube detailing the Israeli catastrophe of myocarditis and vaccine failure. The Pfizer vaccine activates the bodies complement system causing massive blood clots. That is why the VAERS system has 14,000 deaths. Or are all these deaths faked by the (mainly) GP's that record them?
A vaccine was pulled for 50 deaths in the 70's as the deaths are probably understated by 40 times, (as per Steve Kirsch and Jessica Rose, Immunologist who submitted to the FDA at above hearing).
The reason the booster was not voted for under 65s is that they wanted more data before deciding to extend it to under 65s.
And you misunderstand how the VAERS system works - it records deaths that happen soon after vaccinations. Many, the overwhelming majority, are not related to the vaccination. For example VAERS in NZ records 40 deaths, 25 have been investigated, 15 are being investigated, 1 may be related to a vaccine side effect. The rest are coincidence.
What post-covid world?
We cannot get even remotely to a post-covid world until everyone on the globe is vaccinated, so that the potential for further evolution of the virus cannot happen.
One thing is certain about this covid and post-covid world - the climate crisis remains and will overwhelm all else.
Meanwhile it is tedious reading these reckons about how we need to abandon elimination as a strategy.
We welcome your comments below. If you are not already registered, please register to comment.
Remember we welcome robust, respectful and insightful debate. We don't welcome abusive or defamatory comments and will de-register those repeatedly making such comments. Our current comment policy is here.