So apparently we need to apply for a WHO-approved yellow card to travel. Anyone tried??
Thatâs great but you still need to go to quarantine jail when you return to Taiwan, so actually, itâs worthless.
Donât assume things!
Canada, for example, has waived quarantine requirements on arrival for fully vaccinated citizens and permanent residents. Other countries may have similar arrangements. Itâd be interesting to know if this card actually works.
Guy
Yes, Canada has. Because the government, in the end, listened to the experts that said vaccinated passengers are only a moderate if not low risk. Plus there were a number of active constitutional challenges against their quarantine hotel regime.
to be fair, I get why Taiwan still has thatâas annoying as it is. Since vaccinated people can still catch and spread it. Changing it is an open door for Delta to arrive.
Exactly. Delta is already in Canada, so letting Delta in changes little. It would be devastating to Taiwan if we throw the doors open before most people are vaccinated here.
It makes me hate antivaxxers more and more tbh. Theyâre the selfish numbnuts dragging it out and making it longer and longer until I can return home.
Canada also has a large number of vaccinated people. We donât at the moment. The Science would favour keeping quarantine in Taiwan for vaccinated travellers.
Low risk does not mean NO risk.
I saw a good analogy: itâs like being in a lifeboat within sight of shore, and while many are paddling to shore to rescue everyone, some others are paddling away from shore, thereby endangering everyone aboard.
Theyâre like the person on your project group at school who wonât do their fair share, or the sports team member who causes the team to lose by not putting in the effort.
In defence of the anti-vaxxers, humankind as a whole has not really been very good at this âcooperationâ thing for most of my lifetime. I do think it is getting worse though with (at least in the west) a resurgent neofascist right loudly espousing a distinctly narrow view of âfreedom.â
If you want to feel even worse about this sitation, think of what itâll take to get us out of the climate mess weâve created and the level of coordination that will take. COVID-19 is unfortunately just a warm-up act, one that has shown us all how bad we are at this.
Guy
Perhaps the guys who are paddling away are the ones who can see the cannibals on shore warming up the pot? Just a thought.
@afterspivak: accusing people of being neofascists is a pretty mealy-mouthed âdefenceâ. And if youâre worried about climate change, you might want to ponder on how much good $16 trillion might have done in that regard.
Thereâs one good thing about the emerging travel bans on the unvaccinated: a lot of them will finally give in and comply, and weâll probably get to 90%+. At that point it will be so completely obvious that vaccines are making things worse that the game will have to stop.
I think itâs clear that I am not pleased with the response to the climate situation either, right?
And Iâve watched enough about whatâs happened in parts of North America, South America, Asia, and Europe to say: yeah, there is a neo-fascist revival. Sorry if that language makes you uncomfortable, but that is what I see happening.
Guy
Well, there certainly is a neofascist revival, but Iâm not entirely sure who it is youâre referring to. If you want to call people fascists, use the word with its correct meaning. From Wikipedia:
Fascism is a form of far-right, authoritarian ultranationalism, characterized by dictatorial power, forcible suppression of opposition, and strong regimentation of society and of the economy.
Fascists believe that liberal democracy is obsolete and regard the complete mobilization of society under a totalitarian one-party state as necessary to prepare a nation for armed conflict and to respond effectively to economic difficulties.A fascist state is led by a strong leader ⌠to forge national unity and maintain a stable and orderly society. Fascism rejects assertions that violence is automatically negative in natureâŚ
The extreme authoritarianism and nationalism of fascism often manifests a belief in racial purity or a master race, usually synthesized with some variant of racism or bigotry of a demonized other âŚ
Fascism is typically characterized by quasi-religious or mystical beliefs: the NSDAP in particular incorporated a lot of mythology and pseudoscience into their politics.
So here we are, with many world governments commandeering the entire State apparatus to wage a grand war on The Enemy (in this case Nature herself), making up laws as they see fit, suppressing all dissent, carpet-bombing the people with propaganda, spinning lies about âscienceâ that have just enough passing resemblance to the truth to fool non-scientists, harming people on a whim (more so if they happen to be in the âout-groupâ), forcing people to perform hygiene rituals and to carry papers proving that they have complied. And according to you, the people doing this are the good guys, and the people standing up and saying âthis is not democracy, and we are prepared to go to quietly to jail for our beliefs if we have toâ are neo-fascists?
Have any of those âanti-vaxxersâ demanded that we tear down democracy and install a one-party State? Have they threatened to deprive you of your freedoms if you donât follow this weekâs arbitrary rules? Are they attempting to demonize you as a threat to society?
Just sit for a minute and ponder on this. You are not a stupid person, or a bad person, I think. Ask yourself, when the dust clears, do you think you will have a clear conscience? Will you have picked the right side?
Even though it may have leaked from a Chinese lab.
Does anyone know which AZ batch numbers currently cause potential problems with travel to/in the EU?