From The Biggest COVID-19 Vaccine Skeptics? Frontline Health Care Workers by Lawrence Solomon.
I am very much an empirical rationalist and skeptical of conspiratorial anti-vaxxers. On the other hand, there is overwhelming evidence that Government initiatives often fail, Government information is not fully reliable, Government power can be influenced or repurposed by vested interests, that Government agencies and personnel have a much reduced exposure for consequences and accountability than most people, and that anything new and novel takes time to settle in and perform as expected.
So, a new vaccine, created in a rush, with a lot of political interference, and many short-cuts? I'll wait a few months to see whether there are unexpected side effects of unintended consequences. And if there are none? Then off I go to get my jab. Perfectly reasonable.
Solomon is reporting on evidence, some of which I have seen in fragments elsewhere, which is, at the least, striking. Doesn't really changes my intended course of action but it does raise my sensitivity towards new data.
“Outside the United States, frontline workers are likewise skeptical. On March 2, Reuters reported that at most half of the nursing staff in Switzerland’s medical sector, only 30 percent of the staff at Germany’s BeneVit Group care-home operator, and about half of the health workers in French care homes were willing to be vaccinated."
It is a knee-jerk reaction to ask, "What is it that they know that we don't know?" Fair enough. But I doubt that this a matter of positive knowledge. In other words, I doubt that health workers are refusing vaccination because they know something we don't. I suspect that they are refusing/delaying for the same reason as everyone else - experience has taught us not to trust government declarations of truth. It is probably a trust issue.
And who would be better placed to see multiple instances of government proclamation of truths and needs turning out to be wrong or untruthful? Given the consequentiality of the health field, I would suspect health workers to be among the best placed. And therefore, perhaps, among those more rationally skeptical.
I won't change my intended plan. But I will pay closer attention.
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