As is the third wave
India politics thread
- Thread starter Shiva87
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I don't think that is a roadblock. If BJP doesn't have the vaccines, then this is a logical political step. Most politicians are double vaccinated already. So if they are sure that this would not cause largescale mass deaths (apocalypse, dead bodies on roads scenario), they can survive by taking this route.
They already control the Hindi media to a large extent. And they are already taking solid steps like trying to get journalists who report deaths arrested in different cases.
They've clarified that their intent is not to stop the second dose. But then why spend time to understand the efficacy of a single dose rather than test the gap timings?
Also, I really want to understand what the pace of vaccination for other cities on ground is? Here in Mumbai, it's switched to your traditional - if you're well off you'll get it model. Govt slots are down to a trickle but corporates and housing societies as organising massive drives and 90pct of people I know are already one dose down. My organisation has gotten most of our 3k+ staff done.
Think availability is not going to be an issue in a month or so. Sputnik production will kick in in India so urban areas should get cleared quick.
It's a matter of time hopefully. No thanks to anyone but private enterprise. Again.
Also, I really want to understand what the pace of vaccination for other cities on ground is? Here in Mumbai, it's switched to your traditional - if you're well off you'll get it model. Govt slots are down to a trickle but corporates and housing societies as organising massive drives and 90pct of people I know are already one dose down. My organisation has gotten most of our 3k+ staff done.
Think availability is not going to be an issue in a month or so. Sputnik production will kick in in India so urban areas should get cleared quick.
It's a matter of time hopefully. No thanks to anyone but private enterprise. Again.
What concerns me is the rural part of the country. With very few journalists interested or ready to venture into rural India, it is unknown what is happening there.
I agree. From whatever I can decipher from speaking to various companies that do business there, tier 3 and tier4 economic activity is really subpar. It seems like the fear of the virus or the actual virus has gone there impacting the movement.
Don't know if that translates to rural India.
Problem is two fold in rural India actually. One is the reluctance of people to take the vaccine due to WhatsApp forwards and the availability. TN for instance is now switching to a coercion mode instead of optional and convenience mode
From a Yogi supporter on a Modi group:
"Ek chamcha bol raha tha, Modi desh ko 400 saal peeche le gaya. Maine kaha Yogi Ji ko aane de, seedha treta yug me pahuncha denge."
(One idiot was saying modi has taken the country back 400 years, wait for Yogi, he will take us back millions of years (to a mythical golden time)).
these people are insane and proud of being insane.
...
Parents are getting their second dose through the building society, they offered to the maid, she said yes. This was all on the phone, so then they could hear her husband say no, and then he says, let others take, "allah will take care of us". So she has to refuse.
"Ek chamcha bol raha tha, Modi desh ko 400 saal peeche le gaya. Maine kaha Yogi Ji ko aane de, seedha treta yug me pahuncha denge."
(One idiot was saying modi has taken the country back 400 years, wait for Yogi, he will take us back millions of years (to a mythical golden time)).
these people are insane and proud of being insane.
...
Parents are getting their second dose through the building society, they offered to the maid, she said yes. This was all on the phone, so then they could hear her husband say no, and then he says, let others take, "allah will take care of us". So she has to refuse.
Got my first dose here in Bengal. The availability is really poor. People would literally fight to get a dose.
You're underestimating the anti-BJP feeling post second wave. There is discontent which is getting drowned out by the ardent bhakt uncles yelling Modi Modi.
Not sure if its enough for a electoral defeat but this is the lowest BJP's stock has been in more than a decade. They'll probably try to avoid obvious blunders like changing the vaccine regimes.
What do you mean by the bolded bit?
How are residential societies and corporates organising vaccination drives for their own people when there is such a shortage of vaccines at government centres?
This move to allow private hospitals to buy vaccines separately and at a different price has messed things up for the state governments bigtime. Also this different prices for everyone has left a huge scope for corruption.
This move to allow private hospitals to buy vaccines separately and at a different price has messed things up for the state governments bigtime. Also this different prices for everyone has left a huge scope for corruption.
This is my understanding of the entire process. GoI deliberately limited vaccine manufacturing to only two companies and promoted them as 'BJP's vaccine' in return for large profits for the corporates and Electoral Bonds for the ruling party. This tied the interests of the profits for the vaccine manufacturers and the ruling party. Otherwise, there was no reason for India to refuse indemnity to Pfizer, Moderna towards the end of 2020 and promote Covaxin despite a lack of Phase 3 results.
Now that there is a shortage of vaccines, the best possible way of maximizing profits wouldn't be to sell them to the center as they are buying it at the lowest possible cost. It is corporates and societies who have committed to spending whatever is needed to vaccinate their employees/residents and hence they are most price inelastic customers. Similarly, private hospitals also know that there isn't a shortage of people right now who are willing to pay whatever it takes to get vaccinated.
I don't think source wise data is available to analyze the percentage of population vaccinated for free in a government facility vs. people who either themselves or their companies/societies paid. But with more and more companies rolling out initiatives, it is clear that the trend is rising in favor of the former.
Maybe the below
Govt: Do you want vaccine?
Voter: No
Govt: *Bring policeman* .Please explain things to him
When you do things like these, of course people will stay blind:
For example, in my locality (rural village in Trichy), there is a talk of going to a particular locality by house and administering vaccine instead of waiting for them to come to you.
fecking WhatsApp! The ruination of human rationality and logic.
A Muslim friend of mine (who is absolutely pro vaccine) was telling me today that he was told that the rumour within the Muslims in UP is that the CM is giving them an impotency drug rather than the Covid vaccine to control the Muslim population in UP and that is why Muslims are not willing to get vaccinated.
Recently there was news article about how a large number of villagers ran away and some even jumped into a river to avoid being vaccinated when health officials reached their village. Not sure if it's the impotency fear or some other WhatsApp nonsense but that is the reality in a lot of places.
This has been the same rumour that has been going on for polio and other vaccines for many years.
It took years of work in the Muslim community to get rid of polio. Especially in UP and Bihar.
I know of a muslim dominated area nearby who were convinced that this is a BJP ploy to destroy them. My cousin works in a bank in that locality and she resigned her job because people would make it a point not to wear masks. I live in a Christian dominated village (to be fair, the surrounding 30 or so villages are all Christian. You have to understand that I live in central Tamil Nadu where BJP is the butt of all jokes. We have no incidents related to religion based incidents but in my area, there is a definite feeling that taking the shot would lead to death, time frame quoted between immediate to two years). One of my cousins, he is a teacher in an elementary school and he's adamant that if he gets the shot he'll die. He's an alcoholic with high sugar and his wife, mother and father in law have all been affected and recovered but he refuses to concede ground. A famous comedian in TN who died maybe as a result of the vaccination also didn't help matters. The guy had a good heart, went to take vaccination with a lot of publicity but died a couple of days later. This unwanted publicity also created a huge panic.
My family has some clout in my locality mainly due to grandfather and father taking up community projects. We have personally interfered with about 50 families and got them to vaccinate. My other cousin works as a head nurse in the local govt hospital and we coordinate with her and send her people to vaccinate. I'm 39 but I've got both the shots for at least a couple of months now. Although I don't qualify, I mainly got vaccinated to demonstrate to the families that there is no risk. Everyone in my family apart from my 6 year old daughter have got vaccinated. Many people in my village are construction workers and masons. My father got all the contractors to at least give them reduced pay if not the full amount for absences due to vaccination, mainly by threatening them that their family is also at risk with unprotected workers. Few adverse reactions didn't help in the beginning but it is now turning around. What would help most if the government gives free movement to vaccinated people. That will push a lot of people to get vaccinated.
I didn't write this to brag about my own family, but making a point that local community leaders can make a big difference here. The nutters like my cousin who refuse to vaccinate, they can go to hell.
This is because of that stupid whatsapp forward about Nobel prize guy saying everyone will die in 2 years
Regarding the bolded part I wonder what the other thinks. I understand we want everyone to get vaccinated so we could get rid of the virus, but vaccine hesitancy especially among the poor and illiterate is going to be there and difficult to remove.
I wonder what people would think about vaccines in India if lets say AZ had a higher blood clot rate and was banned completely in the US and EU while our government continued using it because of a lack of options? Would you take a vaccine which the developed world has refused to accept? I for one would definitely not take Covaxin (no peer reviewed date) or Sputnik (Manufacturing standards issues in Brazil and Slovakia and no approval from any major organisation yet).
I will take any damn vaccine unless I'm immunocompromised or have serious issues that'd preventing me from acceptance. One death in 500000 is good odds for covid.
I thought Dracula was Hungarian
Should have asked if it was a flying fox bat.
Yeah I know and I have taken Covishield as well. What I asked was what if the odds were worse?
The fact is the government's lack of transparency regarding any data and unnecessary promotion of Covaxin has been dangerous and might result in further vaccine hesitancy. Hope we are sensible enough to place orders for J and J and that Novovax eventually is good enough to get approvals so we have another option. At this moment of time, thank God for AZ otherwise I wouldn't be willing to risk Covaxin or Sputnik on myself.
Apparently Covaxin has gone for WHU to approval and they're expecting approval in July or something.
Took Covishield myself but I didn't have a choice either way. I think it boils down to how desperate you are. I would have been willing to risk Covaxin or Sputnik in the middle of the second wave raging. If things settle down, I believe we should all opt for the best available choice. Vaccine hesitancy is majorly down to silly conspiracy theories and illiteracy. I doubt efficacy studies of vaccines had anything to do with it. My friend was about to take the J and J vaccine while the rollout was paused in US too, but she was in a good position with the choice and availability. Think she opted for AZ two shots.
Beggars can't be choosers bro
State of the country when literally everyone belongs to this bucket
Must have been Pfizer or Moderna then. Pretty sure the US isn't using AZ yet.
Sputnik is fine, folks. Don't be silly and avoid vaccination because of fears that can be easily overcome by reading tonnes of material on reliable sites.
Russian GPS chips though
Maybe you should read this then:
https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2021/04/28/brazil-rejects-the-gamaleya-vaccine
Followed by this:
https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2021/04/28/russian-vaccine-behavior
I wouldn't have taken Sputnik. Nor would I take Covaxin. The safest thing to do is to take vaccines approved by EMA/MRHA/FDA. If issues exist, they're well known and well quantified.
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Interesting. I agree though. I usually watch out for EU/ US approval to agree with it because they have the best standards
We're going to see a tsunami of positive PR over the coming weeks and months
Have yoy watched any thank-you videos? Some of them feel so coerced it's funny.
Both Covishield and Sputnik is fine. In fact now Slovakia is also going to use Sputnik. All of these vaccines work. The more people get vaccinated the sooner we can get back to a normal life.
The hesitancy for covaxin in early stage would have been okay when phase 3 interim results were not available. Why now though?
Only interim results given. Full results not yet published in a journal and not yet peer reviewed which is important to ensure procedures used were water tight
Edit: not that I wouldn't have taken it if my jab was Covaxin. It won't kill me. What's the bloody downside?
The fact that you can't take multiple vaccines is a downside. What if when the results are finally.peer reviewed, they aren't satisfactory? Remember that Brazil have already rejected Covaxin because of GMP protocols? Also those looking forward to foreign travel are going to find this to be a massive problem if WHO approval doesn't come. Some US universities are already not allowing students vaccinated with Covaxin or Sputnik to come in and asking them to be revaccinated.
Don't do good, don't let others do good.