News Coronavirus (COVID-19) Discussion Thread IV

[big_e]

No they can't. They don't have access to my movements unless I give it to them.

They might have access to yours if you carry your smart phone everywhere you go. To make this work practically that would become mandatory.

Your payroll information is sent to the Tax Office each week, and your electoral enrolment and plenty of other government agencies have your address, so they know where you are the vast majority of the time. It's just pulling together multiple data points that they already have.

I also don't think the vaccine passport works in the way you are suggesting. My understanding it is a bit like using your drivers license or other ID to get into licensed premises (back before I went grey and bald) - you just show it upon entry and that's that.

 

[Themanbun]

Its not being asked to be vaccinated that is the problem. Its the proof of it.

There is only one way to have accurate, forge-proof confirmation of vaccination and it will create a network of constant surveillence. It will make it possible for authoritarian governments to track dissidents and refugees. There was a time when my father was an internally displaced person in Australia. He escaped a state (Tasmania in 1980) where the people in power, well some of them, were going to have him killed. He was able to escape because he wasn't carrying a traceable identification document.

If a proper verifiable vaccination passport system associated with smart phones or other smart devices was in place in Afghanistan this year then as soon as the Taliban had access to it they would have access to the locations of everyone they want to take venegence on for helping the coalition over the last 20 years. (AS it is the US left equipment with databases on it anyway so they don't need it but that shows is how easy it is for databases to be compromised and misused and how potentially dangerous they can be.)

If there was something that you could get, say an implantable microchip (that was non cancerous), that only enabled the person carrying it to pass a reader of some sort (with absolutely no other personal information associated, including name and D.O.B.) I'd (probably) have no objection to it.

Or we could just go with a 'forgeable' passport system and just charge people with fraud should they do the illegal thing and forge a passport.

 

[Themanbun]

Should elected officials go 'too far', then you vote them out, plain and simple. You make your voice heard if they are considering going too far, as everything they do has to be legislated and go through parliament. One of the benefits of living in a democracy.

It's all well and good to compare the Australian government to the Taliban or whatever authoritarian dictatorship people most fancy, but the key difference is we have mechanisms for challenging these things and getting a little bit of something without a guarantee that it's going to abused.

 

[DesertRoo]

Should elected officials go 'too far', then you vote them out, plain and simple. You make your voice heard if they are considering going too far, as everything they do has to be legislated and go through parliament. One of the benefits of living in a democracy.

unless you’re talking a far right organisation, point to either two of the major parties that hasn’t said, hang on a second this is going way to far… before we even entertain the idea, we need to have a meaningful discussion about civil liberties and when this system can be dismantled/abolished. It should be written into law before not after.


Btw this is exactly how these organisations recruit.. by people not having representation on major issues.

 

[ferball]

No one is entitled to do those things in Melbourne right now. I have been able to visit my parents, who live about 55 minutes drive away, once in about 6 months.

If you won't take a simple measure to protect yourself and society then it is not unreasonable that you be excluded from activities where there is a significant risk that the virus would be transmitted.

Why is that the case when it wasn't before COVID? The flu was still a major illness that kills people every year and does economic damage to society.

Don't tell me COVID is a more dangerous disease than the flu either because it potentially isn't. The worst cases of flu are probably far worse and that isn't just an anti vaxxer line. The Spanish Flu epidemic of 100 years ago killed between 2 and 5% of the planet's human population at the time at the moment COVID is about 0.05% of the population.

 

[DaveyBoy123]

We've given up Pick 1 as the steak knives, haven't we? Probably going to the Swans!

 

[DesertRoo]

Why is that the case when it wasn't before COVID? The flu was still a major illness that kills people every year and does economic damage to society.

Don't tell me COVID is a more dangerous disease than the flu either because it potentially isn't. The worst cases of flu are probably far worse and that isn't just an anti vaxxer line. The Spanish Flu epidemic of 100 years ago killed between 2 and 5% of the planet's human population at the time at the moment COVID is about 0.05% of the population.

This is an excellent point, and this is the smartest person in the room, talking about the issue.


stupid youtube

Channel

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCiWX1mvn6ZEcZALsIGwNGPQ

video
Prof. John P.A. Ioannidis talk on "COVID-19 epidemiology: risks, measures, and ending the pandemic"

 

[B4Bear]

unless you’re talking a far right organisation, point to either two of the major parties that hasn’t said, hang on a second this is going way to far… before we even entertain the idea, we need to have a meaningful discussion about civil liberties and when this system can be dismantled/abolished. It should be written into law before not after.


Btw this is exactly how these organisations recruit.. by people not having representation on major issues.

As I said earlier, conservatives have never wanted to have a good faith discussion about this. And unless their is a come to Jesus moment, they never will.

If you give the great unwashed rights, man, they might want to enforce them; and where would we be then?

 

[ferball]

To get my digital certificate on my phone just took me 30 seconds. Log into mygov, go to medicare tab, select view pdf of certificate

There's an option to download the PDF, it has 2 separate numbers that would be verifiable like a driver's or passport number. Along with dob and name.

Seems to me that's secure -enough- to not require an RFID under my skin.

It doesn't track me (although my phone does that well enough on its own) and I could print it out if I was so inclined.

No but that is easy to forge isn't it. Anyone can do up a copy of a PDF file.

Fake EU vaccination passports are already easily available. If you want to leave it at that fine, just be aware its a false sense of security and people who don't want to get vaccinated but do want to travel will get fake documents.

If we open up at 90% vaccination rates, which is a reasonable number imo, or even 80 (which isn't imo,) then people who are vaccinated are protected from serious outcomes in the vast majority of cases. People who aren't are at risk and the only people they will harm by spreading the virus are each other.

We don't need documentation about who is allegedly safe and who isn't.

 

[7577969923]

Why is that the case when it wasn't before COVID? The flu was still a major illness that kills people every year and does economic damage to society.

Don't tell me COVID is a more dangerous disease than the flu either because it potentially isn't. The worst cases of flu are probably far worse and that isn't just an anti vaxxer line. The Spanish Flu epidemic of 100 years ago killed between 2 and 5% of the planet's human population at the time at the moment COVID is about 0.05% of the population.

Your arguments really do swerve all over the place. The reality is that we don't have the Spanish Flu and in any given year none of the strains of flu are in any way as dangerous as covid has been so far. Covid is demonstrably more infectious, especially the Delta strain, and the case fatality rate has been significantly higher. It also does nowhere near the economic damage that Covid has done.

In Australia, we have had 1,006 people die from Covid and a case fatality rate of over 2% so far even with all of the extreme measures we have taken. No flu season in living memory comes close to that in Australia. In the UK where they have taken significant lockdown measures, much-improved treatment options and knowledge, have a high level of vaccination, and a high level of residual immunity as a result of past infections, they have reduces the case fatality rate to 0.14%. That is about equivalent to most flu seasons.

The next phase of "living with covid", for want of a better phrase, is for it to become much more like the flu in the way we respond to it. It will be endemic in society, we will take measures to minimise its spread including widescale vaccination, we will have improving treatments including, hopefully, an oral anti-viral that can be administered as soon as you test positive, people will still become quite ill, and some will die, but we won't close down society and the economy, stripping people of the civil liberties in the process.

If you don't like carrying a record on your phone that confirms that you have had the vaccine, you can opt out. I will use it as soon as I can.

 

[DesertRoo]

As I said earlier, conservatives have never wanted to have a good faith discussion about this. And unless their is a come to Jesus moment, they never will.

If you give the great unwashed rights, man, they might want to enforce them; and where would we be then?

Yep people who play politics over principle are absolute campaigners..

The right under trump is only fighting for this because the table has turned, a lot of these campaigners would be laughing if government overreach was targeting minorities.. hopefully it changes perspective you fight for everyone’s or none..

 

[7577969923]

No but that is easy to forge isn't it. Anyone can do up a copy of a PDF file.

Fake EU vaccination passports are already easily available. If you want to leave it at that fine, just be aware its a false sense of security and people who don't want to get vaccinated but do want to travel will get fake documents.

If we open up at 90% vaccination rates, which is a reasonable number imo, or even 80 (which isn't imo,) then people who are vaccinated are protected from serious outcomes in the vast majority of cases. People who aren't are at risk and the only people they will harm by spreading the virus are each other.

We don't need documentation about who is allegedly safe and who isn't.

The view that the only people that the unvaccinated harm is themselves is just naively wrong. People in high-risk groups are still vulnerable even when vaccinated.

What chance do you think we have of getting to 80%, let alone 90% vaccination rates if there is no serious coercion or incentives built into the system.

 

[ferball]

Your payroll information is sent to the Tax Office each week, and your electoral enrolment and plenty of other government agencies have your address, so they know where you are the vast majority of the time. It's just pulling together multiple data points that they already have.

I also don't think the vaccine passport works in the way you are suggesting. My understanding it is a bit like using your drivers license or other ID to get into licensed premises (back before I went grey and bald) - you just show it upon entry and that's that.

If that is it the BFD.

But it won't be, because the first spreader event that happens via a forged document will see the clamour for blockchain based certification, which is the only completely unforgable method I can think of to enable it. And there are people pushing this who have been doing so since the pandemic started. That is what ID2020 is all about.

I don't care that the government knows where I live but I do care if I have to carry my phone if I want to travel anywhere outside my front gate.

 

[Ligma]

You guys got way too much time on your hands

 

[Gasometer]

…any minute now Coles are about to deliver our groceries. Taken 10 days….hmmmmm…

 

[ferball]

Or we could just go with a 'forgeable' passport system and just charge people with fraud should they do the illegal thing and forge a passport.

I wouldn't have a problem with that.

But it won't happen.

 

[ferball]

You guys got way too much time on your hands

D'uh. We're all stuck at home.

 

[Ligma]

D'uh. We're all stuck at home.

Doesn’t mean you can’t be productive lmao.

 

[Sopwiths North]

If you want to experience a two tiered society outcome, go to work next week in a dress and lippy, then collect $300 less for doing the same job, every week, forever.

This. Thank you Intothewind.


The activities and places we're being asked to be vaccinated in order to access are purely recreational/entertainment/extraneous First World privileges. It's restaurants, bars, concerts, gyms, sporting events. For goodness sake - no one has to show ANYTHING to get on public transport, get into a grocery store, or send their kid to school here. And from the sounds of it, Australia's looking at similar.

You will be able to download a secure app onto your phone that you show (not scan) to a human being. (We already exist on an electronic medical data system provincially here, so it's nothing new.) Or you can do a printout on a piece of paper, and carry that instead, if you're someone who's concerned about being "tracked". It's really no drama.

It's also going to encourage more people to get vaccinated. And the more people who do that, the less will get sick and die. That is good.

Every single doctor I've heard speak about this supports it. I understand why.

 

[Themanbun]

Why is that the case when it wasn't before COVID? The flu was still a major illness that kills people every year and does economic damage to society.

Don't tell me COVID is a more dangerous disease than the flu either because it potentially isn't. The worst cases of flu are probably far worse and that isn't just an anti vaxxer line. The Spanish Flu epidemic of 100 years ago killed between 2 and 5% of the planet's human population at the time at the moment COVID is about 0.05% of the population.

I dare say if one of the influenzas of concern spread this far and did this much damage to our societies we'd be in the exact same position that we're in with COVID, with the exact same discussions taking place.

 

[7577969923]

This. Thank you Intothewind.


The activities and places we're being asked to be vaccinated in order to access are purely recreational/entertainment/extraneous First World privileges. It's restaurants, bars, concerts, gyms, sporting events. For goodness sake - no one has to show ANYTHING to get on public transport, get into a grocery store, or send their kid to school here. And from the sounds of it, Australia's looking at similar.

You will be able to download a secure app onto your phone that you show (not scan) to a human being. (We already exist on an electronic medical data system provincially here, so it's nothing new.) Or you can do a printout on a piece of paper, and carry that instead, if you're someone who's concerned about being "tracked". It's really no drama.

It's also going to encourage more people to get vaccinated. And the more people who do that, the less will get sick and die. That is good.

Every single doctor I've heard speak about this supports it. I understand why.

I think scanning into venues, particularly ones like pubs etc, will be with us for a while in Australia to facilitate rapid contact tracing in the event of outbreaks.

 

[Themanbun]

If that is it the BFD.

But it won't be, because the first spreader event that happens via a forged document will see the clamour for blockchain based certification, which is the only completely unforgable method I can think of to enable it. And there are people pushing this who have been doing so since the pandemic started. That is what ID2020 is all about.

I don't care that the government knows where I live but I do care if I have to carry my phone if I want to travel anywhere outside my front gate.

Or that person who forged it or produced forged papers gets charged for fraud and whatever applicable wilfully/recklessly spreading an infectious disease charge is applicable in said state and spends a long time behind bars.

 

[The acurate one]

Well I'm....




Was a meteoric rise through the ranks and fair to suggest I have crashed and burnt on re-entry. Thank you COVID!

 

[Tectonic]

No but that is easy to forge isn't it. Anyone can do up a copy of a PDF file.

Fake EU vaccination passports are already easily available. If you want to leave it at that fine, just be aware its a false sense of security and people who don't want to get vaccinated but do want to travel will get fake documents.

If we open up at 90% vaccination rates, which is a reasonable number imo, or even 80 (which isn't imo,) then people who are vaccinated are protected from serious outcomes in the vast majority of cases. People who aren't are at risk and the only people they will harm by spreading the virus are each other.

We don't need documentation about who is allegedly safe and who isn't.

To forge that certificate you would need my healthcare identifier, vaccine dates, name, dob, and cert #. With a few upgrades and compression to a qr or something connected to a database it would end up no different to swiping a visa wrt privacy.

If that is it the BFD.

But it won't be, because the first spreader event that happens via a forged document will see the clamour for blockchain based certification, which is the only completely unforgable method I can think of to enable it. And there are people pushing this who have been doing so since the pandemic started. That is what ID2020 is all about.

I don't care that the government knows where I live but I do care if I have to carry my phone if I want to travel anywhere outside my front gate.

If blockchain was used that's actually safer than a phone. It doesn't need to be always connected to function.
Here's one of the addresses connected to my ledger
terra1l3g65ceapp3dkhd0xwzpf80x4n72ya03lf48yy
The ledger cold wallet stays offline but the content is readily available at all times. I can compress that address into a qr code for others to send information to the address, but any actions taken by other parties (view it or send to it) do not require any interaction on my behalf.

 

[Sopwiths North]

I dare say if one of the influenzas of concern spread this far and did this much damage to our societies we'd be in the exact same position that we're in with COVID, with the exact same discussions taking place.

Yep, that's true TMB.

One of the big things that sets Covid apart from the flu is the long term debilitation it's causing in many people after they've "recovered". We're seeing lots of Covid "long-haulers" here. It's devastating. Previously healthy young people who now can't function properly in their daily lives.

It's also killing young healthy people. I'm not aware that the flu does that, but I could be wrong.