Compulsory vaccine for flying

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Viewing 15 posts - 16 through 30 (of 78 total)

  • BackOfThePlane
    Participant

    Seriously?

    1 user thanked author for this post.

    ASK1945
    Participant

    [quote quote=1089709]This like other viruses, will mutate (thats what viruses do) and will weaken and somewhat go away.[/quote]

    I believe this is known as “wishful thinking”. Very few viruses “go away” – we control them by vaccination and other precautions (eg as with HIV). Of course they do mutate, so the vaccines must be altered regularly to be effective. I anticipate that I will be getting a Covid jab every year from now onwards, with my annual “flu jab.

    2 users thanked author for this post.

    canucklad
    Participant

    [quote quote=1089718]I believe this is known as “wishful thinking”. Very few viruses “go away” – we control them by vaccination and other precautions (eg as with HIV). Of course they do mutate, so the vaccines must be altered regularly to be effective[/quote]

    Shouldn’t have been allowed to get to the mutation stage

    And this is why we should be collectively “very” angry and be holding our governments and the scientists advising them to account.
    The absolute passive abdication / capitulation to fighting this virus ( China’s fault) by lazily removing our civil liberties and putting us under house arrest (some more severe than others) should be setting off alarm bells

    If we had globally attacked this virus by testing, seeking and isolating carriers we could have eradicated it— And by the way , we already have the logistics and processes in place to achieve that. The time wasted by our politicians following the myopic scientific advice , mixed with total linear thinking has been nothing short of a national/ global scandal

    We should ask ourselves this simple question — Once I’ve got my vaccination where and when and will I be allowed to travel ?


    ASK1945
    Participant

    [quote quote=1089864]Shouldn’t have been allowed to get to the mutation stage[/quote]

    Canuklad

    All coronaviruses mutate – that’s why colds and flu etc etc never completely disappear. Vaccines do work to a certain extent, via regular adaptations and variations of the flu vaccine, undertaken by our fantastic scientists and give some immunity. In the near and medium future we are likely to have endemic Covid-19, although who is to say that in the long-term a cure won’t be found?


    canucklad
    Participant

    [quote quote=1089878]All coronaviruses mutate – that’s why colds and flu etc etc never completely disappear.[/quote]

    Totally agree with you ASK1945, but we allow them to mutate because we generally don’t take any measures to stop the flow of the virus.
    And in normal times the mutations invariably die away naturally as our immune systems and herd behaviour creates resistance.

    With Covid19, we’ve been asked to sacrifice our freedoms, as well as endure economic hardship , change our society for the worse and yet and most damning of all the only answer the experts and politicians can come up with, is even more damaging more of the same ?

    A malaise of acceptance and defeatism seems to be shrouding their decision making –T hat’s what angers me most !!


    ASK1945
    Participant

    Agreed, Canuklad [My “thanks” button no longer consistently appears on this Forum]


    FaroFlyer
    Participant

    canucklad, you say “China’s fault” but the reality is that China reacted quickly and decisively with a total lockdown in Wuhan (population 11 million) and in Hubei Province (population 59 million ). China, and SE Asia knew that it was a variation of SARS, and informed the World about it a year ago. I was in Wuhan a year ago and my wife was asking how bad it was, as she was seeing BBC News talking about SARS.

    The surprise should be that many Western leaders, and I’m thinking Johnson, Trump, Putin, Bolsanaro and many others claimed it was a bit of flu, and failed to act to protect their people.

    COVID is unlikely to go away, and is a variant of SARS, which has been around tomy recollection for approaching 20 year. I believe that vaccines are here to stay, and will be modified continuously, to enable the World to travel again.

    1 user thanked author for this post.

    canucklad
    Participant

    Hi Faro Flyer
    I’m going to try and respond to your points in a measured way and hopefully stick to the topic of this thread.

    [quote quote=1089883]China’s fault” but the reality is that China reacted quickly and decisively with a total lockdown in Wuhan (population 11 million) and in Hubei Province (population 59 million )[/quote]

    Indeed they did, by arresting the Doctor for spreading rumours ( Sedition) who tried to warn the authorities of a possibility of another outbreak of something similar to SAR’s — thus the original narrative that Beijing pedalled was more Trump than the Donald himself .

    Plus I’m not sure I want to live in a country that has the systems and processes in place to do what China eventually did to its citizens at the flick of a switch.

    I could go on , but it’s a travel forum , not a political debate. Although when discussing China, not sure you ever can separate business, travel and politics ?

    Back to the vaccine and travel — what worries me and more importantly disappoints me is that , if China has created an effective vaccine it should be globally accepted, yet their recent actions are just creating a level of mistrust with the regime not seen since Tiananmen square. So much so that we’re now getting diverted by the possibility that anyone of the many conspiracy theories doing the round might have a slither of truth to them .

    2 users thanked author for this post.

    PeterCoultas
    Participant

    Sorry Canucklad… I tried to thank you for your reply to Faroflyer but these days when I press the thanks button on one post it is the previous post that gets the thanks… something wrong with IT at head office here….

    It seems that ASK1945 was also having problems (different) with thank button…


    Mark Caswell
    Keymaster

    Thanks for pointing this out Peter – the same just happened for me. We’ll look into it.


    FaroFlyer
    Participant

    Hi Canucklad,
    Thanks for your comments. One thing that people tend to overlook is that China is made up 34 reasonably independent Provinces. It could be compared with the EU having 28, sorry, now 27 independent Countries, or the USA with 50 independent States. Yes, Beijing has overall control, as does Washington. It was not National Government in Beijing that silenced the ophthalmologist in Wuhan, but Regional Government in Wuhan, Hubei Province. As I mentioned, I was in Wuhan and Hubei Province 10 > 12 January last year, and the SARS outbreak was being openly discussed. No secret from Chinese people. You will doubtless remember that there is another ophthalmologist in Paris who claims that he had a patient with COVID in December 2019. Can you send a link to some of the “original narrative that Beijing pedalled was more Trump than the Donald himself.” I would be interested to read this.

    Not sure about the where you get the information that ” China has created an effective vaccine it should be globally accepted, yet their recent actions are just creating a level of mistrust with the regime not seen since Tiananmen square.” What I have read is that the CoronaVac vaccine has been deemed ineffective in Indonesia and Brasil. China does not seem to have an effective vaccination, but relies on containment.

    I would normally have been in China around now, and would go tomorrow if I would not have to quarantine for 14 days in a hotel room. Interesting that the UK Government are now discussing doing something like this. Real quarantine has been in place in SE Asia and Australasia for 9 months and is working.

    I agree that it is not good for business travel, but it is interesting that, overall, business is doing well, without business travel. I know that many individual sectors are down and struggling, but I look at my pension fund as a barometer and that is up more than 25% in the last 13 months. Not bad.

    To comment on the original thread, I think that a vaccine should be compulsory before getting on a plane, and also a negative test.

    1 user thanked author for this post.

    PeterCoultas
    Participant

    No one seems keen to answer the obvious question…..Vaccination protects by producing antibodies…. people with antibodies cannot fly as the disease also produces (the same) antibodies… how can vaccinated people expect to travel if, in order to to travel, they have to show lack of exposure to the virus by showing they do not have antibodies against the virus… ?????… similar problems with other tests….

    Total lack of awareness that has been the UK hallmark since the problems arose… bumbling boris can’t recognise the piss-up that is in the brewery… potty petal likewise and that other chap whose name will soon have disappeared
    \


    ASK1945
    Participant

    Peter Coultas

    I am NOT a virology expert so I did a simple Google search. Is the answer to the problem that you highlight to present a recent PCR or antigen test pre-travel? Neither of these measure antibodies.

    Many experts are suggesting that antibodies to the current vaccines will disappear 6 to 12 months after vaccination anyway, but the body produces T-cells which are the other line of attack. Also, there are many suggestions that annual vaccination boosters will be necessary, as with the ‘flu jab – and probably given at the same time. I have been having an annual ‘flu jab for around 40 years and haven’t had ‘flu since before my first jab.


    canucklad
    Participant

    Hi FaroFlyer
    You’re on the ground knowledge / experience clearly is better than mine, gathered through various news media, mostly , for obvious reasons western orientated. So I’ll bow to that greater knowledge, thank you for your thoughtful insight
    Sadly, I still feel that there is a deflection of primary responsibility going on here.

    Was listening to a BBC Radio 2 phone in, and really upset me . The feel of the narrative was , who was most to blame amongst our politicians for the deaths of those poor 100,000 + souls that have succumbed . Never did the subject of China’s role in this come up !

    Our politicians can be criticized for the baffling decisions (whether you agree or disagree) they have made trying to manage this, but directly blaming them for individual deaths is IMO extreme and wrong allowing raw emotion to rule.

    Covid19 sadly was a timebomb waiting to go off , as the authorities who could prevent it , didn’t , rather they ignored the evidence from previous epidemics , they made superficial changes to animal husbandry laws etc. and worse, have the authorities at national or local level shut down access to the caves where scientists are with a great degree of certainty trace this back and previous outbreaks too ? The answer is no ?

    Plus Beijing’s obstruction to the WHO investigators reminds me of the trouble the Dutch investigators had when accessing MH370 . First thought that screams into my head is a loud “WHY?”

    Again , getting back to the topic at hand, seems like even if you’re vaccinated and tested our politicians are making noises about an embargo on foreign travel , at least throughout summer and ……….. ???? .

    1 user thanked author for this post.

    PeterCoultas
    Participant

    Ask1945 States correctly that neither PCR nor antigen test measure antibodies. Antibody tests do that and are a relatively quick and cheap way to see if you have them. PCR essentially augments parts of the genome (in the case of covid, RNA) to a detectable level and will need to be done in a proper lab, not at the airport. Antigen tests should also be quick & cheap.

    When you are vaccinated you are given antigens that stimulate the immune system … in the good old days most were inactivated pathogens that developed response against the potentially active look alike. With covid there are some clever approaches – I’m not sure how the oxford one works but presume the vaccination involves an engineered benign virus that includes the covid RNA that codes for the spike proteins. It is the immune response against the covid spike protein that theoretically protects.

    In short, vaccination will result in false positive tests by detecting short sequences of covid viral RNA and/or expression of spike proteins similar to those in someone who has been exposed to or infected by covid. Vaccination will also result in the immune response that hopefully will produce antibodies that, again suggest exposure to covid.

    I am still not sure how to distinguish false positives due to vaccination from real positives due to infection

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