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Government Response To The Coronavirus (4 Viewers)

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Is part of the argument that we wouldn’t have the vaccines at all if drug companies had known that this might happen?  Because that’s really the only argument that would resonate with me and I haven’t really seen a compelling case for it.
I mean, yeah.  Would you spend a ton of money on R&D for anything if you knew the minute it was successful that the govt was going to take it (whatever it is) and give it away to others?

 
Is part of the argument that we wouldn’t have the vaccines at all if drug companies had known that this might happen?  Because that’s really the only argument that would resonate with me and I haven’t really seen a compelling case for it.
I mean, yeah.  Would you spend a ton of money on R&D for anything if you knew the minute it was successful that the govt was going to take it (whatever it is) and give it away to others?
Assuming “you” refers to a corporation, I think that probably depends on whether the corporation could expect to still make profits despite the loss of IP rights.  
 

If you’re literally asking me as a person whether I would invest a bunch of money to save millions of lives despite uncertain profits, the answer is yes (if I had the money).

 
Assuming “you” refers to a corporation, I think that probably depends on whether the corporation could expect to still make profits despite the loss of IP rights.  
 

If you’re literally asking me as a person whether I would invest a bunch of money to save millions of lives despite uncertain profits, the answer is yes (if I had the money).
Sure, but that's your money.  In the case of large corporations, it's not one person's money, and the people making these decisions are supposed to do so in the best financial interests of those who's money they're spending.  Also, my understanding is that these vaccines are built upon IP that has been developed over the last decade to make it easier to create new vaccines.  You're not just necessarily giving away the specifics of THIS vaccine but the foundation these companies have been developing for a long time to create the next generation of vaccines quicker.  That's a lot of IP to just arbitrarily give away.

 
isn't it incredible that anyone who dies who has covid or possibly might is counted as a covid death but anyone dying who just had the vaccine is questioned as being counted as a vaccine death?

the vast majority of people dying of covid was already elderly and sick and many would have died soon anyway - which is what they're saying of vaccine related deaths but NOT of covid deaths

I mean wow - but ok, I challenge you this

give me a link to how many deaths per day in your state - or states, or USA ........ and you can google and find that in 10 seconds, right ?

now, give me the number of deaths from the vaccines - can you find anywhere that shows that information ? 

why ?

 
Are we really talking about profiteering off a world-wide pandemic?

What have we become, as a nation, if that is the case?
Wal-Mart and Lowes and Home Depot etc made billions off the pandemic by lobbying to stay open while at the same time killing their competition with laws that shut those businesses down

Yes - money is normally the root of everything, power is a close second root

 
isn't it incredible that anyone who dies who has covid or possibly might is counted as a covid death but anyone dying who just had the vaccine is questioned as being counted as a vaccine death?

the vast majority of people dying of covid was already elderly and sick and many would have died soon anyway - which is what they're saying of vaccine related deaths but NOT of covid deaths

I mean wow - but ok, I challenge you this

give me a link to how many deaths per day in your state - or states, or USA ........ and you can google and find that in 10 seconds, right ?

now, give me the number of deaths from the vaccines - can you find anywhere that shows that information ? 

why ?
Science is your friend.  It really is.  When you aren’t an expert......please, for your own sake, defer to expert advice.

I’m not a carpenter.  And thus I didn’t build my own house.  You aren’t a doctor or an epidemiologist, are you?  Or a statistician?

 
Sure, but that's your money.  In the case of large corporations, it's not one person's money, and the people making these decisions are supposed to do so in the best financial interests of those who's money they're spending.  Also, my understanding is that these vaccines are built upon IP that has been developed over the last decade to make it easier to create new vaccines.  You're not just necessarily giving away the specifics of THIS vaccine but the foundation these companies have been developing for a long time to create the next generation of vaccines quicker.  That's a lot of IP to just arbitrarily give away.
FWIW.....this is mostly true.  The rub here is the "R" in this equation has been primarily in labs at major colleges and hospitals funded primarily by government funds.  The "D" part is how the companies can monetize all the work on the "R" side in their business model.  We shouldn't be pretending that these companies are doing a majority of the research on which all this stuff is built.  That is happening in labs at hospitals and colleges all over the country/world.

Understanding this is why I have a such a hard time with "if we don't pay these companies, they'll stop doing all this great work" as an argument...the "work" they are doing is squarely on the backs of those doing the heavy foundational lifting and those people aren't going to stop.  

 
Are we really talking about profiteering off a world-wide pandemic?

What have we become, as a nation, if that is the case?
I think it's extremely good that people are able to make a profit by producing life-saving drugs.  Of all the things that a person could possibly be rewarded for, that would be near the top of my list.

(Other items near the top of my list would be doctors profiteering from helping people with medical problems and teachers profiteering from teaching kids stuff).

 
Wal-Mart and Lowes and Home Depot etc made billions off the pandemic by lobbying to stay open while at the same time killing their competition with laws that shut those businesses down
Did not happen. Competitors to Wal-Mart, Lowes, etc. absolutely stayed open in the U.S. I don't believe ANY retail of any type was shut down anywhere in the U.S.

 
I think it's extremely good that people are able to make a profit by producing life-saving drugs.  Of all the things that a person could possibly be rewarded for, that would be near the top of my list.

(Other items near the top of my list would be doctors profiteering from helping people with medical problems and teachers profiteering from teaching kids stuff).
How much profit?

I am under the impression that these companies have been paid handsomely (and are in fact profitable) with the investment the US government made in the initial (and on-going) research, in addition to purchasing 300M doses.

If you are suggesting that profits trump all - then I think we have lost our way as a country, and as a people.

 
Here's a pretty good article on the patent issue that takes a side, kind of, but is relatively balanced about it.
Honest opinion - very poorly written article.

I get that IP protections are important, and I also understand the concept that for every drug that is successful, there is research done on 10 that are unsuccessful - and the industry has to pay for all of the R&D via the drugs that are successful.

But, a lot of R&D is in fact subsidized via government grants.  And, in this particular case - I have not seen anything to suggest that the Pharma companies are not profiting from the R&D that went into the development.  

Now, if you want to argue that the IP waiver will not help the bottleneck around the world - that is a fair, albeit very different, argument than suggesting that companies are being "punished" here.

 
How much profit?
Given the cost of covid-19 -- all the deaths, all the shutdowns, the kids kicked out of school, the people locked in their homes, all the unemployment, all the business failures -- I hope they make all the profits.  Like eleventy trillion dollars or something would still be a bargain.

 
Guy gets rich from making a video game about shooting zombies -- great.

Guy gets rich from throwing 15-yard outs -- great.

Guy gets rich from filming a movie about superheroes -- great.

Guy gets rich from producing a drug that saves millions of lives and gets the world economy unstuck -- PROFITEERING

 
Given the cost of covid-19 -- all the deaths, all the shutdowns, the kids kicked out of school, the people locked in their homes, all the unemployment, all the business failures -- I hope they make all the profits.  Like eleventy trillion dollars or something would still be a bargain.
😢

There is more to life than profits/money.  If we are only motivated by money, we are in a sad state.

 
Guy gets rich from making a video game about shooting zombies -- great.

Guy gets rich from throwing 15-yard outs -- great.

Guy gets rich from filming a movie about superheroes -- great.

Guy gets rich from producing a drug that saves millions of lives and gets the world economy unstuck -- PROFITEERING
I am not sure that anyone here is making that argument.   :shrug:

 
FWIW.....this is mostly true.  The rub here is the "R" in this equation has been primarily in labs at major colleges and hospitals funded primarily by government funds.  The "D" part is how the companies can monetize all the work on the "R" side in their business model.  We shouldn't be pretending that these companies are doing a majority of the research on which all this stuff is built.  That is happening in labs at hospitals and colleges all over the country/world.

Understanding this is why I have a such a hard time with "if we don't pay these companies, they'll stop doing all this great work" as an argument...the "work" they are doing is squarely on the backs of those doing the heavy foundational lifting and those people aren't going to stop.  
This happens a lot,and not just with drugs.  The government funds some research, the person/people doing that research make a breakthrough, start a company, get patents, and get rich.  I'm not a fan of that.  I don't think the remedy is to just give away all their hard work for free though.

 
But, a lot of R&D is in fact subsidized via government grants.  And, in this particular case - I have not seen anything to suggest that the Pharma companies are not profiting from the R&D that went into the development.  

Now, if you want to argue that the IP waiver will not help the bottleneck around the world - that is a fair, albeit very different, argument than suggesting that companies are being "punished" here.
The US is well on it's way to 70% inoculation, while India is at 2%.  A large part of that is that the US has fostered pharma, while other places haven't.  We finally get a bit of a payback for subsidizing the world's medicine.

More proof of this - the most inoculated country in the world, the Seychelles, is having a massive rise in cases.  This makes sense when it's noted that they have used the Chinese vaccine, which has awful effectiveness numbers, nowhere near what's needed to achieve herd immunity.   Sinovac is ~40% effective, PFE vaccine is 90+% effective, Moderna also 90+% effective.   

Giving up IP rights by fiat is a dumb idea and will provide no advantage in getting the vaccine out to the world.  Pharma in the US will have added trillions to the GDP of the US by being able to produce highly effective vaccines.  Many, many trillions.  And we're worried about the pennies being made by pharma in this effort.  Truly a :rolleyes: moment.

 
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Last year, racing to develop a vaccine in record time, Pfizer made a big decision: Unlike several rival manufacturers, which vowed to forgo profits on their shots during the Covid-19 pandemic, Pfizer planned to profit on its vaccine.

***

Pfizer has been widely credited with developing an unproven technology that has saved an untold number of lives.

But the company’s vaccine is disproportionately reaching the world’s rich — an outcome, so far at least, at odds with its chief executive’s pledge to ensure that poorer countries “have the same access as the rest of the world” to a vaccine that is highly effective at preventing Covid-19.

***

Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca both vowed to sell their vaccines on a nonprofit basis during the pandemic. Moderna, which has never made a profit and has no other products on the market, decided to sell its vaccine at a profit.

***

Pfizer frequently points out that it opted not to take federal funds proffered by the Trump administration under Operation Warp Speed, the initiative that promoted the rapid development of Covid-19 vaccines.

But BioNTech (Phizer's partner) received substantial support from the German government in developing their joint vaccine. And taxpayer-funded research aided both companies: The National Institutes of Health patented technology that helped make Pfizer’s and Moderna’s so-called messenger RNA vaccines possible. BioNTech has a licensing agreement with the N.I.H., and Pfizer is piggybacking on that license.

***

The vaccine is expected to keep generating significant revenue for Pfizer and BioNTech, especially because people are likely to need regular booster shots. Pfizer said on Tuesday that it expects its vaccine to generate $26 billion in revenue this year, up from its previous estimate of $15 billion. The company has been signing supply deals with governments for more shots to be delivered in the next few years, including options for Canada as far out as 2024.

“We believe that a durable demand for our Covid-19 vaccine — similar to that of the flu vaccines — is a likely outcome,” Mr. Bourla told analysts on Tuesday.

That could ultimately make the vaccine one of the best-selling pharmaceutical products ever. Pfizer’s cholesterol medicine, Lipitor, currently ranks No. 1, having brought in about $125 billion over 15 years.

Vaccine developers have been trying to play down the financial upside.

***

A group of developing countries led by South Africa and India has proposed to the World Trade Organization that intellectual-property protections be loosened on coronavirus vaccines during the pandemic.

The proposal is intended to pressure pharmaceutical companies to ensure access to vaccines for developing countries, perhaps by offering discounted prices or by partnering with other companies to increase capacity.

“It could just be an incentive for companies to come forward and collaborate,” Mustaqeem De Gama, councilor at the South African mission to the W.T.O. in Geneva, said in an interview late last year. “But if left to the choice of companies, usually companies will refuse to collaborate and share what knowledge they have.”

ETA: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/04/business/pfizer-covid-vaccine-profits.html

 
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Is part of the argument that we wouldn’t have the vaccines at all if drug companies had known that this might happen?  Because that’s really the only argument that would resonate with me and I haven’t really seen a compelling case for it.
I think it's all a moot point because I believe the WTO would need to unanimously agree, which seems tough, but I think the concern is that it's a slippery slope giving precedent to force companies to hand over IP for anything deemed for the greater good IMO. 

Cancer kills a lot of people. Billions, if not trillions of private money has been spent trying to cure cancer in my lifetime with no result. Hopefully one day somebody will figure it out. Should that company give up their IP for the greater good? If that is the expectation I don't know what practical motivation there would be to privatize all the risk and socialize the end result. I'd assume most of the focus of spending and research would simply go toward the status quo of developing and selling mega expensive cancer treatments. Unfortunately, I kind of believe that is already the case with cancer research. Much more lucrative to treat it. Curing cancer would put a lot of those treatment companies out business and I don't really see the positive in disincentivizing companies further in the quest for a cure of anything. 

BioNtech is mainly an oncology company who's primary focus has been the development of a platform using mRNA to target and cure individual cancers. They pivoted from oncology at the onset of the pandemic because they thought the technologies they were developing for cancer might work for COVID. I'd assume some the the IP they used in developing the COVID vaccine is part of the platform they've developed for other diseases. They have a multiple sclerosis vaccine in development, along with some cancer vaccines. I highly doubt they will be compensated for all the money they burn if those vaccines fail to work, yet should be compelled to give up IP on the one product that did work and whose profits would be used for further research and development of other diseases? mRNA technology has been researched and trialed for over 25 years without any money being made from it until now. Who paid for 25 + years of working on that?

In the end, if the companies involved want to give up their IP it should be entirely on them to give it, not have it taken. Moderna indicated in October that they would in fact give IP related to their COVID vaccine so really not sure what more Biden and the WTO wants here other than political posturing which I believe is what it's all about sadly. 

https://investors.modernatx.com/news-releases/news-release-details/statement-moderna-intellectual-property-matters-during-covid-19

 
Giving up IP rights by fiat is a dumb idea and will provide no advantage in getting the vaccine out to the world.  Pharma in the US will have added trillions to the GDP of the US by being able to produce highly effective vaccines.  Many, many trillions.  And we're worried about the pennies being made by pharma in this effort.  Truly a :rolleyes: moment.
The alternative view - the US economy is inextricably linked to the global economy - and if the world, particularly places like India and China are mired in a much lengthier pandemic - that hurts the US economy also.

Now, the point that the bottle-neck is not the IP - I have already said that is a valid argument, and we should be working with other countries to alleviate that concern.

I do believe that it is in the US best financial interest (i.e. not simply morally right) to get an effective vaccine to as many people as possible.  The notion that this may become like an annual flu shot - which is what Phizer is predicting - means that the per-cost shot needed to cover R&D, should be much lower than a simple 2-shot dosage...

 
Are we really talking about profiteering off a world-wide pandemic?
Yes, and it's a wonderful thing.  Look at what we have produced, in record time, to inoculate the world against this scourge.

What have we become, as a nation, if that is the case?
The same as we've always been.  We remain the most productive, most ingenious nation on earth.  And those characteristics will benefit the earth immensely as the vaccines we've produced are consumed by earth's populations.

 
I do believe that it is in the US best financial interest (i.e. not simply morally right) to get an effective vaccine to as many people as possible.  The notion that this may become like an annual flu shot - which is what Phizer is predicting - means that the per-cost shot needed to cover R&D, should be much lower than a simple 2-shot dosage...
Is there any proof that this is not the case?  This isn't exactly sugar water that's being made. From everything I've seen these companies are making as much as they can as fast as they can. 

As far as increasing production, it's one thing to have vaccine manufacturing farmed out to Teva and another to Joe Smith Pharma in Mumbai.  With these short timeframes the technical capability to handle this properly and not poisoning folks lies in relatively few places.

 
The US is well on it's way to 70% inoculation, while India is at 2%.  A large part of that is that the US has fostered pharma, while other places haven't.  We finally get a bit of a payback for subsidizing the world's medicine.

More proof of this - the most inoculated country in the world, the Seychelles, is having a massive rise in cases.  This makes sense when it's noted that they have used the Chinese vaccine, which has awful effectiveness numbers, nowhere near what's needed to achieve herd immunity.   Sinovac is ~40% effective, PFE vaccine is 90+% effective, Moderna also 90+% effective.   

Giving up IP rights by fiat is a dumb idea and will provide no advantage in getting the vaccine out to the world.  Pharma in the US will have added trillions to the GDP of the US by being able to produce highly effective vaccines.  Many, many trillions.  And we're worried about the pennies being made by pharma in this effort.  Truly a :rolleyes: moment.
Yep. We're talking about a $20-$40 product to help stop severe illness and potentially death. This is fast food meal pricing for industrialized nations. I'm sure the wealthier countries and rich philanthropists would have no problem subsidizing and helping poorer countries. Forcing companies to hand over their IP doesn't address the supply issue at all. Making the people responsible for finding a solution the bad guys seems really, really dumb.

 
I think I agree that patents are one of the problems with inadequate vaccine supply but probably not the binding constraint right now. We should probably be spending a lot more money ramping up vaccine production capacity. Nevertheless, I'm big fan of Bernie's prizes-not-patents legislation and I'm not going to miss this golden opportunity to plug it again. Doling out prize money for good inventions and then releasing that IP into the public domain would help increase supply and bring down costs of drugs for consumers while maintaining profit incentives for pharma companies. My guess is that these vaccine companies would be much more comfortable giving up their patents if we paid them a ####load of money to do it.

Here’s a Plan to Fight High Drug Prices That Could Unite Libertarians and Socialists

 
Science is your friend.  It really is.  When you aren’t an expert......please, for your own sake, defer to expert advice.

I’m not a carpenter.  And thus I didn’t build my own house.  You aren’t a doctor or an epidemiologist, are you?  Or a statistician?
science ..... you mean the people who said asbestos, fenfen, talc, DDT, Roundup etc etc were ok and no threat to anyone ? 

science ..... what an odd word to use alongside expert

there are websites that list hundreds of things science once said was ok and now they know years later they were wrong and the products are NOT ok

science

 
This happens a lot,and not just with drugs.  The government funds some research, the person/people doing that research make a breakthrough, start a company, get patents, and get rich.  I'm not a fan of that.  I don't think the remedy is to just give away all their hard work for free though.
It happens in almost every instance and I'm not saying these companies give away their hard work for free.  What I AM saying is that "their hard work" is almost ALWAYS overstated and this case doesn't seem to be an exception.

I try really hard to be objective on these things, but I fully admit I don't think our healthcare complex should be driven by profit so it's hard for me at times.  I guess the best way to explain my view would be along the lines of what IK said above about hoping people would profit off this.  I agree with that.  I just disagree with the "who" part of "the people"...it wouldn't be the companies as much as the people who've been doing the legwork science that these companies are profiting off of.  That, however, is virtually impossible given the terms these researchers agree to when they accept money from the federal government to fund their research.  

 
Did not happen. Competitors to Wal-Mart, Lowes, etc. absolutely stayed open in the U.S. I don't believe ANY retail of any type was shut down anywhere in the U.S.
what ?

Wal-mart were super clusters/spreads of covid - they were the exact OPPOSITE of what was needed to stop spreading of a virus - large groups gathering daily was NOT what was supposed to be happening (remember we closed churches and concerts and sports and schools) but Wal-mart had the power to demand to stay open - and they made record profits 

https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/27/business/stores-closing-coronavirus-june/index.html

https://fortune.com/2020/09/28/covid-buisnesses-shut-down-closed/

(same for USA)

Deemed an essential service, it was never forced to shut down during the pandemic. Business boomed and the U.S.-based company raked in record profit like many big box stores in 2020. This is in stark contrast to many small and medium-sized businesses that have been hit with periods of closure and restrictions, bringing many to the brink financially.

https://globalnews.ca/news/7707524/walmart-profit-covid-19-small-business-struggle/

 
So you're doing the same thing? Like I said, be better.
yes, its equal and fair to count the same way

Its crazy to count differently to get the results desired - count the same way 

Where is the online stats for vaccination deaths to date? why can't you find them ?

 
Assuming “you” refers to a corporation, I think that probably depends on whether the corporation could expect to still make profits despite the loss of IP rights.  
 

If you’re literally asking me as a person whether I would invest a bunch of money to save millions of lives despite uncertain profits, the answer is yes (if I had the money).
Sure, but that's your money.  In the case of large corporations, it's not one person's money, and the people making these decisions are supposed to do so in the best financial interests of those who's money they're spending. 
I realize this is getting pretty far afield from any concrete discussion about this particular move by the Biden administration but am I the only one that sees this as highly problematic?  All of us as individuals probably agree that, to the extent possible, saving millions of lives is more important than earning a profit.  But we as a society have created a corporate form in which corporations are, by law, supposed to act in a profit-making manner that often conflicts with what we know as people to be against the public interest.  

It reminds me a little of the doomsday scenarios where someone builds an Artificial Intelligence system with a particular objective that inadvertently destroys the world.  Maybe it's time that we recognize that corporations can be dangerous things that the government needs to be careful aren't acting in ways that are detrimental to actual human beings.

 
I realize this is getting pretty far afield from any concrete discussion about this particular move by the Biden administration but am I the only one that sees this as highly problematic?  All of us as individuals probably agree that, to the extent possible, saving millions of lives is more important than earning a profit.  But we as a society have created a corporate form in which corporations are, by law, supposed to act in a profit-making manner that often conflicts with what we know as people to be against the public interest.  

It reminds me a little of the doomsday scenarios where someone builds an Artificial Intelligence system with a particular objective that inadvertently destroys the world.  Maybe it's time that we recognize that corporations can be dangerous things that the government needs to be careful aren't acting in ways that are detrimental to actual human beings.
It's not much of an exaggeration to say that the corporations you're talking about just saved the world.  We can quibble over the degree to which that's literally true, but would anybody have wanted to reach herd immunity the hard way?  Or stay locked down indefinitely?

The government can always buy vaccine doses or buy patent rights if we want to allocate them altruistically.  I would support that in the particular case of covid-19 vaccines.  I don't see anything virtuous about stealing them from the people who are the heroes of this story.

Also, Turry!

 
It's not much of an exaggeration to say that the corporations you're talking about just saved the world.  We can quibble over the degree to which that's literally true, but would anybody have wanted to reach herd immunity the hard way?  Or stay locked down indefinitely?
I’m very happy that these companies created amazing vaccines, and obviously I would not choose either of your two other options.

But I’m not convinced that our current system is the only way that such vaccines could have been created.

 
All of us as individuals probably agree that, to the extent possible, saving millions of lives is more important than earning a profit. 
Sure.  However, saving lives and making money, in this instance, are not fighting against each other.  Quite the opposite - they are and have been in concert.  The system we have has done something unprecedented with the speed and efficacy of their development.  

Think of the alternative - if we want a good analogy the CDC was in charge of creating the initial COVID tests.   :tfp:   

I, for one, am glad well paid, competent people were in charge of vaccine development.  :thumbup:

 
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Now, the point that the bottle-neck is not the IP - I have already said that is a valid argument, and we should be working with other countries to alleviate that concern.

I do believe that it is in the US best financial interest (i.e. not simply morally right) to get an effective vaccine to as many people as possible.  The notion that this may become like an annual flu shot - which is what Phizer is predicting - means that the per-cost shot needed to cover R&D, should be much lower than a simple 2-shot dosage...
This is exactly where I fall. I would hope that these private companies would take lesser profits for the greater good of humanity.   I think there is some of that happening.   The companies should be incentivized to break down those bottlenecks to production and to with with plants worldwide to produce enough for the world's population.  If that means the developed countries spend 100x more per dose than other countries, then so be it.

 
Wal-mart were super clusters/spreads of covid ...
Miles beside my point, which was: Wal-Mart's business competitors (e.g. Target, Big Lots, local groceries, local hardware, etc.) were at no point shut down anywhere.

(remember we closed churches and concerts and sports and schools) but Wal-mart had the power to demand to stay open - and they made record profits 
Churches, concerts, and schools are not Wal-Mart or Lowe's business competitors.

Deemed an essential service, it was never forced to shut down during the pandemic. Business boomed and the U.S.-based company raked in record profit like many big box stores in 2020. This is in stark contrast to many small and medium-sized businesses that have been hit with periods of closure and restrictions, bringing many to the brink financially.

https://globalnews.ca/news/7707524/walmart-profit-covid-19-small-business-struggle/
For one, this article is about Canada, which might have had different protocols for closing businesses. Even with that ... I have great doubts that Canada was closing Wal-Mart's direct competitors. In addition -- the article does not give any details about the businesses closed. This is the sum of the detail given: "This is in stark contrast to many small and medium-sized businesses that have been hit with periods of closure and restrictions." What small and medium businesses? What fields? What industries?

 
I could see mom and pop hardware stores or small bodegas or other small stores being forced to close due to space and ventilation restrictions that may allow big box stores to stay open.  It's also possible that people stayed away from the places where they were likely to be in close contact with others.  Also possible that WM, Target stayed open due to their critical functions for food and medicine distribution. 

 
Sure.  However, saving lives and making money, in this instance, are not fighting against each other.  Quite the opposite - they are and have been in concert.  The system we have has done something unprecedented with the speed and efficacy of their development.  

Think of the alternative - if we want a good analogy the CDC was in charge of creating the initial COVID tests.   :tfp:   

I, for one, am glad well paid, competent people were in charge of vaccine development.  :thumbup:
:goodposting:

Some people just arent happy with the government buying the vaccine and giving it to them for free. You dont get to full on socializm until big corp cant make money and the wealth is redistributed. 

 
Miles beside my point, which was: Wal-Mart's business competitors (e.g. Target, Big Lots, local groceries, local hardware, etc.) were at no point shut down anywhere.

Churches, concerts, and schools are not Wal-Mart or Lowe's business competitors.

For one, this article is about Canada, which might have had different protocols for closing businesses. Even with that ... I have great doubts that Canada was closing Wal-Mart's direct competitors. In addition -- the article does not give any details about the businesses closed. This is the sum of the detail given: "This is in stark contrast to many small and medium-sized businesses that have been hit with periods of closure and restrictions." What small and medium businesses? What fields? What industries?
I don't think you understand who Walmarts business competators are. All Best Buys shut down (yes some voluntarily).  Their customers flocked to Walmart and Target.  

 
yes, its equal and fair to count the same way

Its crazy to count differently to get the results desired - count the same way 

Where is the online stats for vaccination deaths to date? why can't you find them ?
The 3 deaths (out of more than 8 million) due to blood clots and the J&J vaccine were widely reported and the FDA suspended use of the drug for 3 weeks to analyze the risks.

Severe allergic reactions to Covid vaccines (VAERS) that result in death are about 2 to 5 per million.

These stats are very easy to find, Google is your friend.

I may be wrong but it seems like you are looking for a conspiracy where there is none.

ETA:  Oh wait, I see Tucker has been talking about this so now I understand where this is coming from...

 
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Miles beside my point, which was: Wal-Mart's business competitors (e.g. Target, Big Lots, local groceries, local hardware, etc.) were at no point shut down anywhere.
yes, those local ma and pa stores WERE closed - where did you live during the shutdowns that they wasn't shut down? They dang sure were here in Arkansas 

Churches, concerts, and schools are not Wal-Mart or Lowe's business competitors.
correct, but they were not allowed because you don't want people congregating in one localized placed because it spreads disease

except Wal-mart 

 
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