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re: medical workers
it seems that 94% of doctors (AMA June 2021) are vaccinated, 50% of remaining plan to.
a less clear Aug 2021 survey of 5000 nurses:
88% of nurses are “vaccinated or planning to” – I presume before the firing deadline.
59% of nurses are in favor of mandates, another 12% – only for those who face the public, 29% againstWelcome back!
Now we know that Hashem accepts tefilos without a proper name, just as CTLawyer ben CR
There seems also to be a difference of opinion what R Chisda means by “shok” in Berachot 24:
Hazon Ish thinks it is a lower part of the leg, Mishna Berurah and Moshe Feinstein – upper.
Hazon Ish reasoning – nobody in their wildest dreams (pardon the pun) would walk with revealed upper leg, so R Chisda obviously means “lower”. This is, obviously, cultural, and R Feinstein had different environment starting w/ 1960s … Not sure about Radin.Do we know what was typical hem line in 3rd century Bavel? That would resolve the shok machlokes.
PS economists claim that the length of the hemline is inversely proportion to GDP growth rate ..
R Ovadia Yabi’a Omer 6 YD 14 answers exactly this question and says if this is a binary choice, trousers are better
Others add a couple of considerations similar to ones Avira is mentioning:
1) trousers might be OK in some community, but should not be worn in those places where they are not acceptable
2) skirts might have become a symbol analogous to the kippah – this is how Jewish ladies identify themselves as observant. My projection from the use of kippah analogy: you could and should use it generally in friendly atmosphere, but OK to avoid when you are in non-friendly environment> Many epidemiologists believe the vaccine is weakening the immune system
could you name these epidemiologists so that we can track their argument?
kollel?man> They are counting anyone vaccinated within 14 days as unvaccinated.
in this paper, I believe they would include into “unvaccinated” – indeed those who were just vaccinated and also those who were already infected. Both would affect the numbers. Let’s see how we can clean it up:
1) there is separate data for immediate 2 weeks after vaccine. First, the Phase 3s answered that question clearly for the original virus. It was also reviewed for Delta later on, for example in Israel. It is the easiest to check what happens exactly after vaccine is given.
2) You can also separate effects of vaccination from recently vaccinated: in July-August, the rate of vaccination was very low (0.2% per day) and most were for younger people, as older ones were already vaccinated some time ago and not yet getting boosters: so those numbers should be reliable.
3) including those who were previously infected affects numbers much more. But presuming that previous infections decrease new infection (as many reasonably think), this would only make numbers for not infected even higher. Effect of previously infected on vaxed is harder to bound, but as the overall effect is on the order of 10, and proportion of previously infected is (way) less than 50%, the effect would still exist under very stringent assumptions.
4) similar results come from Israel and England, where vaccinations were performed much faster, so confusing effects are much smaller.
Are we discussing the midrash about people travelling on a boat and one of them drilling a hole?
There is also I think a gemora about Shmuel (?) refusing to go on a boat with inappropriate people, so not to get in danger with the reshaim.
Abba> There is no logic to this vaccine mandate.
I think you are trying to say “there is no perfect logic”. I think we all got used to order and predictability: 3-day delivery is so yesterday, emails arrive immediately, you sign up for school a year in advance. Go back 10 years and maybe to a different continent, and you’ll be standing in line to get basic necessities, attacked by bandits on a random day, find out about what happened in another country several months later.. This is all good, but just don’t feel so entitled..
That said, it is no question that government institutions are overwhelmed and often inconsistent. They are “imperfect men governing imperfect men”, as (perfectly) envisioned by Reb Madison.
So, instead of sniping, calmly take, and say thank you, for what is good and discard the klipot.let’s try a modern version: In reality, the sun is much larger than the moon. Also has original light, while the Moon is just the reflection. Hashem had rachmannut on the moon, and may made them appear of similar sizes. The Moon was not happy with that, did not appreciate the hesed and still complained.
Also, shows a difficulty of judging a case where you are involved. The Moon maybe had a point, but how do you express the point where you you may benefit from the solution? If the moon would would have studied mussar, it would understood that it will be punished and not rewarded. It should have offered to become smaller itself, it could have ended up being bigger as a reward.
/ the big issue here is that they are restricting people from living their lives
This seems to be the core of the complaint: I have my life figured out, and you’re making demands on me: mask, vaccine… For many of us, it is clear that the demand is from Hashem, and we need to respect the demand and respond accordingly, with some honest differences in opinions possible. Others are simply denying that they need to do something. They just want to have the life they have. This is like a guy who refuses to eat on Yom Kippur, even if it is medically advised. He’s not rebelling against the doctor, he’s rebelling against Hashem.
More and more people are saying that vaccine hesitancy is due to the American unique Spirit of Independence. I’m not sure it is 100% true, or a way to excuse current government doesn’t know what to do. So this Independence quality creates both entrepreneurship that leads to vaccines on one side and to conspiracy theories on the other. I wonder whether it is even more true for the Jews who are called azim for a reason in beitza 25. Hashem supposedly give us Torah to direct azut in the right direction. It means if someone is is not directing azut in the right direction, he’s not understanding the Torah correctly. QED
I wonder if the reason psychological pattern for people who do not trust vaccines, masks, or anything else. I’m hesitant to ask for an IQ, but how about a non judgmental mattress, like briggs Myers? I would be curious to see these test results for people who are pro or against vaccines. Disclosing mine: INTP
RW, why you repeating the same wild ideas without ever responding to what you are told here? A simple question – do you also have problems with J&J? Novavax? AZ? Sputnik? Sinopharm? None of these multiple, mostly independently developed, vaccine satisfy you?
> On the other hand if the natural antibodies weren’t enough to protect individuals, you would have seen a rise in cases to the likes of the beginning of the pandemic.
It is well documented that rates are 10x higher for unvaxed. Overall rates are down due to most vulnerable people vaccinated. US now has 1/3 of hospitalizations from the highest pre-vaccine peak in January, so it is still pretty big.
DY > The evidence shows that previous Covid infection offers more protection than vaccination
This may be true, but not fully established yet. “Infection” may involve a little or a lot of exposure. Vaccines also do not produce same results – some people get more protected, some less, but the response to the vaccine seem to be more regular – after all, everyone gets the same carefully measured amount of exposure.
It may be that Feds are too conservative in not trying to guess better rules and use instead “lo plug” approach instead of measuring antibodies and giving personal guidelines to people. It may be that virus specialists are trying to make public policy without having training. I sae recently that CDC Dr Walensky mentions a need for social scientists to get involved. This is a little late and a little slow …
this sounds like a silly argument, bordering on inappropriate – Avira preferring short skirts and UJM – pants … As to the answer to your hypothetical question, it well may depend on who is asking. Avira clearly thinks of someone from his community and he has a point. Someone from a different community might have a different attitude depending on her environment. So, maybe there is no one answer here. Teiku.
Avira,
hajj – Muslims arguably is one major monotheistic religion, and you always look at Israeli problems from a religious prospective, now turns out you are affected by secular trends of seeing Muslims as enemies. Seems like you are erring on a side of hating in multiple dimensions. And hajj would be different from Taliban, lots of non-Taliban muslims go on hajj, according to my limited knowledge.Re: Rav Ovadia – I don’t think this is about individual psak. I think the objection is to the overall trend of seeking external “inspiration”. And as derech eretz kodma l’Torah, a multitude of reported transgressions and misbehaviors makes this activity suspicious. Now, I happened to meet one of the first, if not the first, people who was able to visit Uman at the end of USSR, and he was an erliche Chasidishe Rebbe, so there should not be an objection to visiting Uman. Maybe you can advise them to visit at some other times except R’H?
Re:Ukraine. I understand that Ukrainians, as well as other Eastern-European countries are primarily focused on negating Russian influence, so they venerate any kind of local heros (although Chmelnitski was pro-Russian, so I am not sure here). We just need to make sure we are not getting in the same trap as between WW1 and WW2 when Jewish nationalists joined Nazis and Soviets in pressing these countries for their treatment of minorities. Whatever their sins were/area, they paled in comparison to those vandals. Same now, Ukraine has a Jewish president and is half-occupied by Russia, and we should worry about their 17th century sins … Same as fighting Poland regarding expiration of their restitution law while there is no restitution law in Russia and Belorussia as far as I know. Wouldn’t we want to have Volozhin Yeshiva back?
RW, unvaccinated people could just do the rest of the people a favor and keep out of museums on chol hamoed.
For those who had Covid, whether by act of G-d or by negligence, it is not enough to rely on that alone to conclude that you are not in danger or not a danger to others. Those who measure high antibody count have a stronger leg to stand on, but I am not sure what is percentage of people who 1) belong to the group of unvaccinated, 2) had Covid, and 3) continue monitoring their antibody level. (1) and (2) are mostly uneducated either very rural or very urban, while (3) presumes some
level of education. This might cover a section of Jewish community, but probably not the others.That said, FDA & CDC will probably get to the issue of antibodies of covid survivors after it resolves all the other urgent issues – boosters for Moderna, J&J, vaccines for children, etc. These people sound a little overworked for now …
How is wearing red strings goes with the fashion of wearing black only and traditional halakha that red is not appropriate for women?
eric55, there are multiple vaccines from multiple companies and governments available. Do you have an explanation for why each of them is not to be trusted?
a little more details on the paper provaxx refers:
for 18-49 and 50-64 groups, risk of hospitalization decreases by 10-15 both in april-june and june-july time intervals, and death rates by 16x (with 18-49 in april-june being 30x)for 65+, hospitalization decrease in april-june is 13 and in june-july 8, death decrease 16 and 10.
So, there is substantial decrease for 65+ and in one measure for 18-49 due to a combination of delta and time. It is possible that part of the decrease is due to an increasing number of previously infected among remaining unvaxed and more active people moving from unvaxed into vaxed column.
RW > Boycott everything whether you are vaccinated or not.
RW, 81% of adults are vaccinated in NYC. So, I suspect most of them would prefer to boycott you rather than support remaining refusniks. Also, on old USENET, there used to be a rule that the one who first invokes Nazis in an argument – loses it.
we do know some things now. So, look at early predictions and how they compare with later knowledge to estimate magnitude of errors and biases. For example, we had phase 3 results for vaccines and later much bigger observational studies. So, you can compare phase 3 results with observations under same conditions (original Wuhan and right after vaccine) – those were pretty on target both in safety and efficiency. and then, there are changes in conditions – Delta and 6 months later.
As ahdus seems to be a theme of Sukkos, poking and shoving other congregants looks counter-productive. Is it the same in Israel, (areas where people serve) – one would think that people trained in holding their weapons safely should be able to deal with lulavim.
Maybe it is the idea – walking around with lulavim forces us to confront a need to be careful and not to poke others?
covid caveat: you can use a four amot long lulav to protect your private space.
RW> -are you being sarcastic? Because there are definitely cases when people have tried many options.
I am not sarcastic. I am sure there are people who tried them all. But if this were true in general, we would have many questions on each of these steps: where can I find a kosher gym, should I daven or run first, what is teshuva for offending people, how do I measure quality of my learning, etc.
RebE: If the information entered into a computer is not reliable, the information received after its processing will also be unreliable.
Not always. If information is noisy but unbiased and multiple pieces of information are independent, then by Central Limit Theorem, average estimate will converge to a normal distribution with variance decreasing linear with number of independent pieces of information. Thus, meta-analysis of multiple legit independent studies, each with different flaws, is better than each of them separately.
GH > Bigger minyanim are better minyanim
It may be not just size, but also unity (a Sukkos theme): R Berel Wein says that if there are 100 Jews in a town, Hashem wants them to be in one shul. What they do? 10 shuls with 10 people. What do they end up with? 11 shuls with 9 people. I am adding – you can be the 100th and make a minyan at all of them. This is all pre-covid, of course,
Someone (an inside person) here said now: we have inside and outside people. for Sukkos, we all join together finally.
> shul is too small.
R Salanter called a guy a thief for standing near a window in a filled out shul, monopolizing fresh air.
Goldilocks > Very few people today would be capable of living like that.
I understand. We do indeed conclude that many tried to live like Rashbi (learn and not work) and failed. Still, we can’t take some inspiration from them. So, if there is anything you can emulate them and help humanity to fight the pandemic, please do – skip a vacation, a playdate, sit further away from an old person, wear a mask properly when others are putting it half-way ….
paraphrasing: Rashbi and his son came from the cave and saw a farmer running in a double mask. This guy only cares about viruses and not Torah! Why do you have two masks, they asked – one to protect myself, and one to protect other Yiden ….
Beitzah 25 proves from a piece of raw meat from a hospitalized cow that we are not allowed to eat at the end of yom tov – that derech eretz is from the Torah and, in general, Hashem gave us Torah so that oterwise, Jews with their azut will not give space to other nations to live.
A fitting food for thought for Simchat Torah and a l’chaim for an increasing derech eretz on this site.
> have gone OTD
Read Bibi’s father insightful book about Abarbanel where he concludes that however painful it was for Ab. to miss the upcoming signs of expulsion, at the end, he would probably not be able to save the day anyway against the tide, but his later work encouraged the expelled Jews to find strength to continue. (some of the description parallels times in Bibi’s reign where he could not stop the tide, but persevered anyway ..). So, the family road has a direction.
Mindful, what is the explanation given for the preference of black? I could not get the theory if it out of my daughters.
In Gemora, black was for those who wanted to go sin and would go to a different city. True, there were inappropriate colors (the Rav who assaulted an inappropriately dressed lady at the shuk who turned out to be non-Jewish and he gladly paid the fine). And it is cultural (I think an appropriate present for an Israeli lady is linen clothes, while for Babylonian – colorful).
But what is specific explanation for black v. any other reasonable colors?
> While in Bais Yaakov I don’t think you’ll find much of this problem. It often starts (among those with this problem) after graduation.
I think we often missing the logical links in such cases. If the above statement is partially true, then it is obviously a problem with educational system if the problem starts after (as Mindful explained). Similarly, for MO school graduates that do not take tefiling to college, the problem started at school.
A longer view – when we blame “Reform”, we sometimes do not consider that something in the Jewish community made Reform an attractive alternative at the time.hajj is same shoresh as Hebrew hag. So, an appropriate word. Also, notice that Hag usually means traveling to EY, while both Hajj and Umanjj call for people to travel from EY to a foreign place. There are also theological parallels that are probably not appropriate for this site.
It seems that everyone agrees that last year was full of aveiros like a Ukrainian Rimon – breaking the laws in multiple countries, infecting people, creating Hillul Hashem. This year hopefully went better and healthier, but I wonder whether one may associate oneself with an event that acquired such great reputation.
quoting a local Rav – we have now inside (davening) yidden and outside yidden,
now for sukkos, we finally have everyone in the same placenisht, you have a point. Except these guys are not really going anywhere, they landed on the same planet they started! Would you be patur min Hasukkah if you decide to run marathon around your town?
Anyway, travelling “hutz laaretz” is definitely taking a new meaning.
> Anyone who wants to live a somewhat normal life, not locked into their homes
Careful with “anyone”.
Vilna Gaon with his lifestyle would not get it. Rashbi would not have even noticed.4. Proven safer than the disease by a factor of at least 100x
Does not apply. chance of having many of the diseases are well below 1%, thus vaccine has to be 100x safer than the disease. With COVID, we are talking at least 10%, if not 50% depending on age and lifestyle. Thus, you just need to prove that vaccine is 10x safer than the disease. This essentially means that we should have started giving vaccines to nursing home residents before Phase 3.
I’ve seen research pointing both ways – on one hand, low levels of re-infections, on the other – statements similar to “Health” – second time cases are sometimes much harder. Possibly, this means that first infection creates immunity for a large group of people (for some time?) but makes it worse for those whose immunity did not work out well.
Just speculating what could be the difference between re-infection and infection after vaccine:
1) unclear doses – may be not enough to provide sufficient immunity
2) internal damage after the first infection creates additional risk for the 2nd infection?More on possible reasons for anti-everything movement:
maybe Jewish community became too comfortable in US gwtting into a Yeshurun state of mind. We have established communities, built institutions, have places for comfortable vacations. So, a disruptive event that requires changing lifestyle in some way is rejected emotionally. What do you mean I cannot travel to my favorite vacation spot because of some invisible reason? I am doing so many mitzvos, please do not distract me with the unseen reality.YS
> distrust of governmentI presume of “liberal” government. I think most communities were very pro-Trump. So, how does it make sense to not accept vaccines developed under Trump?
> anti-vax leaders
This might be a one off, the overall phenomenon cuts across many communities, minhagim and even gefilte fish line> social media
I also think this is huge. I think what is happening: an average “traditional” internet user has capability to do an internet search, look up some sites, understands difference between sites. Social media user (esp second-hand one who just hears something from a social media user) does not differentiate between sources as they all appear on his wall (that’s what I heard, not a social media user myself).maybe something is lost in transmission or translation. Could you please clarify what exactly is your doctor saying.
> how you think others should behave but imply several times that they aren’t.
So, if you agree with the proposed path and think that people are doing that, please inform me of that.
If you disagree, then explain why. That is what discussions are for.> When you make dumb comments like this
Apologize for the joke.
> relay the general worries and line of thinking some doctors have.
As I mentioned, you need to compare similar effects – either deaths or serious illness in both cases.
You mentioned before about “your doctor” not recommending you a vaccine – is this what YOUR doctor say? If he is indeed so sloppy, you may look for another one. But maybe you refer to a generic internet-quoted “doctor”, then we can just disregard what they say.DY > First show me evidence that frum people are more antivax than the general population
a good question. We may not be more, depends what your baseline is. I implicitly compare Jews I know with non-Jews I know professionally and this may not be a fair comparison. Furthermore, what we see in the street does not include people who are not in the street. Still, I’d like to understand what is the source of the movement. We have here people posting information but it is hard to pin-point what lead them to this position.
DY > Show me evidence that cloth masks do anything
The Impact of Community Masking on COVID-19: A Cluster-Randomized Trial in Bangladesh, Sep 2021A
by Jason Abaluck et althey randomized 600 villages with no and different types of masks and followed for 8 weeks. Surgical masks show 12% decrease of symptomatic cases and 35% in 60+ y.olds . Really cloth masks – 6%, not sure why someone wears those when surgical ones are available. SD increased by 5% (7% in the market, 0% in mosques)
Note this is a result of real-life intervention by giving out masks, not by forcing everyone to wear them. In villages with no intervention, 13% would wear them, after intervention – 42%. Also increased in mosques. Distribution of masks mattered, no additional measures – text messages, payments, ads did not matter.
> he is an oines and was not m’vatel p’ru ur’vu.
On the other hand, if someone fulfils pru urvu while not taking a vaccine, doing shiduchim without the mask, and having an unsafe wedding – this would be mitzva b’yadei averah. Not sure what the status of the kids would be then.
Yserbius > with all this anti-vaccine propaganda that the frum oilem is unfortunately falling for
Can we pin-point what is the source? I have several hypotheses, each might be true to an extent. Any others?
1) Is it simply that some get info from social media and then propagate to those who do not have online source or time/inclination/skills to search? If this is so, then it shows that our community is not protected against online viruses even being in large part offline, as information still travels.2) Community effect – when you are in a community where nobody takes precautions, you behave like everyone and then start processing information accordingly to justify that.
3) Giving up – given that community is so connected and every family has lots of kids in schools, we were often hit hard early and then there is not much hope to avoid exposure in daily life. If you crum lots of people/kids into a shul/school without good ventilation for a long time, then masks will not help much, short of N95s. Then, like in (2), you have to convince yourself that you are not doing an aveirah by giving credence to any piece of information that justifies your position.
4) Inability to see a big picture of effect on older people, etc – a lot of sickness happens in nursing homes, hospitals, etc, people, B’H are not falling down on the street. So, a little of information, ability to count, and abstract thinking is required and is not alaways avialble.
5) Even as many (most?) Rabbonim are for vaccination, and many are for various measures (capsules, testing, masking), seems like a large part of the community does not hear or does not care. Maybe eople surrounding gedolim and those in charge of media are affected like everyone else and are not emphasizing the message? For example, I saw for the first time this spring that R Edelsteon, Ponevezh, gave his first public lecture – and only to vaccinated students and behind a huge screen. I did not see anything before that he was isolating for a year before. I may have missed that, but maybe it was just not a cool story to publish?