This week in the feminist insane-o-sphere: Oxford teacher worried Oxford will find coronavirus vaccine

[Metaphor]

Dr Emily Cousens, who teaches 'vulnerability and gender' at Oxford, worries that Oxford winning the race to a coronavirus vaccine will make Oxford and Britain look good.

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/coronavirus-vaccine_uk_5ea067f2c5b6b2e5b83ba372

In need of a question for your next Zoom pub quiz? Here’s one: “We’re getting used to seeing either Boris Johnson, Dominic Raab, Matt Hancock, Robert Jenrick, Rishi Sunak or Michael Gove wheeled out on to our screens at 5pm. But why is Jenrick the odd one out?”




The answer: he’s the only one that didn’t go to Oxford. (He went to Cambridge.)


Oxford, that symbol of British excellence. Producing the finest minds in the world and, if this week’s news is anything to go by, leading the race to develop a vaccine against Coronavirus.


Surely I should be proud that the institution I have spent a decade studying and subsequently teaching at, could be the first to develop the vaccine?
Not only proud, but hopeful and excited. My 72-year old Dad is usually a highly social and active man. However, he lives on his own in a very rural village and is becoming increasingly worried that he won’t be able to return to his usual ways for years – until such a vaccine is developed.

So why was my initial relief at hearing Oxford and Imperial are racing away to develop the vaccine followed by worry?

Let’s suppose that Oxford does develop the first vaccine. What happens next?


David Heymann, an infectious disease specialist at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, who heads a panel that advises the World Health Organization (WHO) on Coronavirus, says that there could be a production shortage. Researchers have also warned that this will lead to rich countries hoarding supplies. We were too late when it came to stockpiling PPE, but we won’t be caught out again. The vaccine, developed by our finest brains, is ours. And it will be Britons who are prioritised for protection.


If there is enough vaccine to go round, the UK will be the world’s saviour. We’ll quickly forget the devastating delay of the UK government to take action, as Boris Johnson proudly safeguarded British institutions like individual liberty, and the pub, over lives.


We’ll forget the lessons that the pandemic has taught us so far: that the UK and the US are in fact not exceptions at the global stage. That we are not only vulnerable but can also afford to learn lessons from countries, regardless of whether we have a special relationship with them – such as South Korea. That being white, male and Oxford-educated may not be the only criteria for effective leadership (the countries whose responses have been most widely praised, Germany and New Zealand among others, are all led by women).

The developments made by researchers at Oxford have been enabled by international co-operation among the research community. Whilst China has faced lots of questions about it’s sharing of information politically, according to Laura Spinney: “The unprecedented speed of virus development so far is thanks in large part to early Chinese efforts to sequence the genetic material of Sars-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19. China shared that sequence in early January, allowing research groups around the world to grow the live virus and study how it invades human cells and makes people sick.”


Dr Claas Kirchhelle, fellow of the Research and Policy Unit at the Oxford Martin School, confirms that “there has been a radical sharing of information and a very rapid sequencing of the pathogen’s genetic code.” It is clear, then, that international co-operation saves lives.


But do our Oxford-educated leaders think like this? Coronavirus is a global epidemic. Yet, rather than motivating the UK to take a proud role at the global stage, as leaders like Macron have urged, the UK is increasingly resorting to patriotism in response.


This war-time rhetoric is useful in instilling a sense that this is a moment when individuals need to make sacrifices and put the country first. But this time, the enemy is not a nation. It is a microbe. So why do our collective solidarities end at the border?


The race is on and researchers at Oxford are doing vital, life-saving work. But races have winners and losers. If my university is the first to develop the vaccine, I’m worried that it will be used as it has been in the past, to fulfil its political, patriotic function as proof of British excellence.


The story will be clear: China, once again, has unleashed a threat to civilisation. But the best brains of the UK have saved the world.


Whilst I’m hopeful that I will be able to visit my Dad soon, this must not overshadow the key lesson of coronavirus: international cooperation saves lives. The research community knows this. Let’s hope our politicians do too.

 

[krypton iodine sulfur]

Dr Emily Cousens, who teaches 'vulnerability and gender' at Oxford, worries that Oxford winning the race to a coronavirus vaccine will make Oxford and Britain look good.

That doesn't seem to be accurate. It reads more like she is concerned that Oxford developing the first vaccine will be used by politicians pushing a narrative of propagandistic British exceptionalism which relies on 'white, male and Oxford-educated' leadership. Such a move would come at the cost of honest appraisal of what lessons should be learned in terms of national response and international cooperation in the face of global crisis, and acceptance that other nations with leadership from varying demographics had superior response. (Maybe I'm not exactly on the mark, but it seems to be in that vein).

 

[Arctish]

Dr Emily Cousens, who teaches 'vulnerability and gender' at Oxford, worries that Oxford winning the race to a coronavirus vaccine will make Oxford and Britain look good.

That doesn't seem to be accurate. It reads more like she is concerned that Oxford developing the first vaccine will be used by politicians pushing a narrative of propagandistic British exceptionalism which relies on 'white, male and Oxford-educated' leadership. Such a move would come at the cost of honest appraisal of what lessons should be learned in terms of national response and international cooperation in the face of global crisis, and acceptance that other nations with leadership from varying demographics had superior response. (Maybe I'm not exactly on the mark, but it seems to be in that vein).

You're on the mark.

 

[Jokodo]

Dr Emily Cousens, who teaches 'vulnerability and gender' at Oxford, worries that Oxford winning the race to a coronavirus vaccine will make Oxford and Britain look good.

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/coronavirus-vaccine_uk_5ea067f2c5b6b2e5b83ba372

In need of a question for your next Zoom pub quiz? Here’s one: “We’re getting used to seeing either Boris Johnson, Dominic Raab, Matt Hancock, Robert Jenrick, Rishi Sunak or Michael Gove wheeled out on to our screens at 5pm. But why is Jenrick the odd one out?”




The answer: he’s the only one that didn’t go to Oxford. (He went to Cambridge.)


Oxford, that symbol of British excellence. Producing the finest minds in the world and, if this week’s news is anything to go by, leading the race to develop a vaccine against Coronavirus.


Surely I should be proud that the institution I have spent a decade studying and subsequently teaching at, could be the first to develop the vaccine?
Not only proud, but hopeful and excited. My 72-year old Dad is usually a highly social and active man. However, he lives on his own in a very rural village and is becoming increasingly worried that he won’t be able to return to his usual ways for years – until such a vaccine is developed.

So why was my initial relief at hearing Oxford and Imperial are racing away to develop the vaccine followed by worry?

Let’s suppose that Oxford does develop the first vaccine. What happens next?


David Heymann, an infectious disease specialist at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, who heads a panel that advises the World Health Organization (WHO) on Coronavirus, says that there could be a production shortage. Researchers have also warned that this will lead to rich countries hoarding supplies. We were too late when it came to stockpiling PPE, but we won’t be caught out again. The vaccine, developed by our finest brains, is ours. And it will be Britons who are prioritised for protection.


If there is enough vaccine to go round, the UK will be the world’s saviour. We’ll quickly forget the devastating delay of the UK government to take action, as Boris Johnson proudly safeguarded British institutions like individual liberty, and the pub, over lives.


We’ll forget the lessons that the pandemic has taught us so far: that the UK and the US are in fact not exceptions at the global stage. That we are not only vulnerable but can also afford to learn lessons from countries, regardless of whether we have a special relationship with them – such as South Korea. That being white, male and Oxford-educated may not be the only criteria for effective leadership (the countries whose responses have been most widely praised, Germany and New Zealand among others, are all led by women).

The developments made by researchers at Oxford have been enabled by international co-operation among the research community. Whilst China has faced lots of questions about it’s sharing of information politically, according to Laura Spinney: “The unprecedented speed of virus development so far is thanks in large part to early Chinese efforts to sequence the genetic material of Sars-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19. China shared that sequence in early January, allowing research groups around the world to grow the live virus and study how it invades human cells and makes people sick.”


Dr Claas Kirchhelle, fellow of the Research and Policy Unit at the Oxford Martin School, confirms that “there has been a radical sharing of information and a very rapid sequencing of the pathogen’s genetic code.” It is clear, then, that international co-operation saves lives.


But do our Oxford-educated leaders think like this? Coronavirus is a global epidemic. Yet, rather than motivating the UK to take a proud role at the global stage, as leaders like Macron have urged, the UK is increasingly resorting to patriotism in response.


This war-time rhetoric is useful in instilling a sense that this is a moment when individuals need to make sacrifices and put the country first. But this time, the enemy is not a nation. It is a microbe. So why do our collective solidarities end at the border?


The race is on and researchers at Oxford are doing vital, life-saving work. But races have winners and losers. If my university is the first to develop the vaccine, I’m worried that it will be used as it has been in the past, to fulfil its political, patriotic function as proof of British excellence.


The story will be clear: China, once again, has unleashed a threat to civilisation. But the best brains of the UK have saved the world.


Whilst I’m hopeful that I will be able to visit my Dad soon, this must not overshadow the key lesson of coronavirus: international cooperation saves lives. The research community knows this. Let’s hope our politicians do too.

Reading really isn't your strong suit. In what universe is "worries that Oxford winning the race to a coronavirus vaccine will make Oxford and Britain look good" a fair summary of what she says?

She seems to be worried that British politicians will use Oxford's success to deflect from and silence criticisms of their own rather wanting response to the pandemic, propagandistically, and against the interest of the scientists involved in the actual research, using it to paint themselves as the good guys saving the world from the evil unleashed by China. Which, if they get through with it, will leave Britain and the world more vulnerable to the next pandemic, or the next global threat, since the real lessons to be learnt about preparedness and global cooperations will be drowned out from the discourse.

 

[Metaphor]

Dr Emily Cousens, who teaches 'vulnerability and gender' at Oxford, worries that Oxford winning the race to a coronavirus vaccine will make Oxford and Britain look good.

That doesn't seem to be accurate. It reads more like she is concerned that Oxford developing the first vaccine will be used by politicians pushing a narrative of propagandistic British exceptionalism which relies on 'white, male and Oxford-educated' leadership.

[snipped]

Yes. That's why she's worried about it.

She also seems strangely confused about what discovering a vaccine would mean for manufacturing and distributing a vaccine.

 

[Metaphor]

Reading really isn't your strong suit. In what universe is "worries that Oxford winning the race to a coronavirus vaccine will make Oxford and Britain look good" a fair summary of what she says?

Because she wrote an entire article about the imagined negative consequences that follow from Oxford and Britain looking good. Indeed, you summarise it below.

She seems to be worried that British politicians will use Oxford's success to deflect from and silence criticisms of their own rather wanting response to the pandemic, propagandistically, and against the interest of the scientists involved in the actual research, using it to paint themselves as the good guys saving the world from the evil unleashed by China. Which, if they get through with it, will leave Britain and the world more vulnerable to the next pandemic, or the next global threat, since the real lessons to be learnt about preparedness and global cooperations will be drowned out from the discourse.

 

[Jokodo]

Reading really isn't your strong suit. In what universe is "worries that Oxford winning the race to a coronavirus vaccine will make Oxford and Britain look good" a fair summary of what she says?

Because she wrote an entire article about the imagined negative consequences that follow from Oxford and Britain looking good. Indeed, you summarise it below.

She seems to be worried that British politicians will use Oxford's success to deflect from and silence criticisms of their own rather wanting response to the pandemic, propagandistically, and against the interest of the scientists involved in the actual research, using it to paint themselves as the good guys saving the world from the evil unleashed by China. Which, if they get through with it, will leave Britain and the world more vulnerable to the next pandemic, or the next global threat, since the real lessons to be learnt about preparedness and global cooperations will be drowned out from the discourse.

I happen to agree that BoJo touting a vaccine as more or less his personal success while continuing his course of austerity that brought the British health care system in its sorry state is thus directly responsible for tens of thousands of British dead would not be the best possible outcome from this mess.

I happen to agree that the main take home lesson shouldn't be how great Oxford is (though great it is), but that international cooperation is essential to fight a crisis of global proportions, and that starving essential infrastructure (like health care) and declaring any capacities not used under average load as wasteful is a bad idea when we know that demand can spike unpredictably to a multiple of that average.

I happen to agree that this is a lesson the Tories are likely to be less happy about, so the threat that they might try to silence it in favour of their preferred narrative is real.

Don't you? And if so, why not?

And how does any of that make what you wrote a fair summary of what she wrote?

 

[krypton iodine sulfur]

Because she wrote an entire article about the imagined negative consequences that follow from Oxford and Britain looking good.

Not really. The issue isn't the UK looking good. The issue is political opportunism potentially using this to create a slanted narrative on overall covid-19 response. You've worded the relationship backwards. It's not that bad things will happen if the UK looks good. It's that looking good will be the consequence of actions which are otherwise negative.

She also seems strangely confused about what discovering a vaccine would mean for manufacturing and distributing a vaccine.

I'm not sure why you say that. She cited her source for her position. You disagree with that source?

 

[Metaphor]

I happen to agree that BoJo touting a vaccine as more or less his personal success while continuing his course of austerity that brought the British health care system in its sorry state is thus directly responsible for tens of thousands of British dead would not be the best possible outcome from this mess.

I find it hard to believe that Boris Johnson would take personal credit for a vaccine success developed by scientists at Oxford. However, if he did, I find that to be precisely of no consequence. People are not idiots and people who support him already will continue to support him, and people who did not support him will continue to not support him.

I happen to agree that the main take home lesson shouldn't be how great Oxford is (though great it is), but that international cooperation is essential to fight a crisis of global proportions, and that starving infrastructure and declaring any capacities not used under average load as wasteful is a bad idea when we know that demand can spike unpredictably to a multiple of that average.

This is not part of the argument by Cousens, but it doesn't seem to me it has anything to do with whether Oxford discovers a vaccine first.

But also, you can't build a highway with ten lanes in each direction, just because it would be would be fully utilised at peak times, just like you don't build and staff hospitals for a one-in-a-hundred year event.

I happen to agree that this is a lesson the Tories are likely to be less happy about, so the threat that they might try to silence it in favour of their preferred narrative is real.

Don't you? And if so, why not?

And how does any of that make what you wrote a fair summary of what she wrote?

She wrote that she was worried that Oxford would discover a vaccine first, because it would make Oxford and Britain look good. It's essential to her argument (that this "looking good" will entail consequences she regards as negative).

Now, I happen to think that that is deranged. It's a deranged thing to worry about.

I want a vaccine to be found as soon as possible and I want the knowledge of the vaccine spread as far and wide as possible when it is discovered.

 

[Metaphor]

Because she wrote an entire article about the imagined negative consequences that follow from Oxford and Britain looking good.

Not really. The issue isn't the UK looking good. The issue is political opportunism potentially using this to create a slanted narrative on overall covid-19 response. You've worded the relationship backwards. It's not that bad things will happen if the UK looks good. It's that looking good will be the consequence of actions which are otherwise negative.

She also seems strangely confused about what discovering a vaccine would mean for manufacturing and distributing a vaccine.

I'm not sure why you say that. She cited her source for her position. You disagree with that source?

Yes. If Britain discovered the vaccine, does she imagine it will keep the information secret, or patent a vaccine that it will charge other countries to use?

Does she imagine Britain is the only country capable of manufacturing vaccines? If so, it doesn't matter who discovers it, because Britain will need to manufacture it (and therefore control it) anyway.

Does she imagine that if Britain discovers the vaccine and then manufactures it on a large scale, that Britain is not entitled to distribute the vaccines it has manufactured to her own people? Does she imagine Britain is going to prevent other countries manufacturing it? Does she imagine Britain will guard it jealously and stockpile it while people in desperate need in other countries die?

 

[Jokodo]

I find it hard to believe that Boris Johnson would take personal credit for a vaccine success developed by scientists at Oxford. However, if he did, I find that to be precisely of no consequence. People are not idiots and people who support him already will continue to support him, and people who did not support him will continue to not support him.



This is not part of the argument by Cousens, but it doesn't seem to me it has anything to do with whether Oxford discovers a vaccine first.

It has everything to do with whether the story about what Britain did wrong is going to be told, or supplanted by a story only about what it did right.

But also, you can't build a highway with ten lanes in each direction, just because it would be would be fully utilised at peak times, just like you don't build and staff hospitals for a one-in-a-hundred year event.

Bad analogy. Traffic jams don't kill 10000s of people.

A better analogy is dams, and yes, we do regularly build dams designed to withstand a once-in-a-century or once-in-a-millennium flood, to avoid just that.

I happen to agree that this is a lesson the Tories are likely to be less happy about, so the threat that they might try to silence it in favour of their preferred narrative is real.

Don't you? And if so, why not?

And how does any of that make what you wrote a fair summary of what she wrote?

She wrote that she was worried that Oxford would discover a vaccine first, because it would make Oxford and Britain look good. It's essential to her argument (that this "looking good" will entail consequences she regards as negative).

Now, I happen to think that that is deranged. It's a deranged thing to worry about.

It is deranged to worry "[Britain will] quickly forget the devastating delay of the UK government to take action", that they might "forget the lessons that the pandemic has taught us so far: that the UK and the US are in fact not exceptions at the global stage. That we are not only vulnerable but can also afford to learn lessons from countries, regardless of whether we have a special relationship with them", that "the key lesson of coronavirus: international cooperation saves lives" might not get the attention it deserves?

I want a vaccine to be found as soon as possible and I want the knowledge of the vaccine spread as far and wide as possible when it is discovered.

Which part of her article makes you conclude that she doesn't? Anything at all? If anything, she's worried that politics might try to monopolise the vaccine in a way that's offensive and alien to the culture of international cooperation in which the researchers are working, thus making it less accessible.

 

[krypton iodine sulfur]

Not really. The issue isn't the UK looking good. The issue is political opportunism potentially using this to create a slanted narrative on overall covid-19 response. You've worded the relationship backwards. It's not that bad things will happen if the UK looks good. It's that looking good will be the consequence of actions which are otherwise negative.




I'm not sure why you say that. She cited her source for her position. You disagree with that source?

Yes. If Britain discovered the vaccine, does she imagine it will keep the information secret, or patent a vaccine that it will charge other countries to use?

Does she imagine Britain is the only country capable of manufacturing vaccines? If so, it doesn't matter who discovers it, because Britain will need to manufacture it (and therefore control it) anyway.

Does she imagine that if Britain discovers the vaccine and then manufactures it on a large scale, that Britain is not entitled to distribute the vaccines it has manufactured to her own people? Does she imagine Britain is going to prevent other countries manufacturing it? Does she imagine Britain will guard it jealously and stockpile it while people in desperate need in other countries die?

Why don't you just rtfa? It's something I consistently don't get with you. I understand your use of a clickbait title for the thread. It's silly, but it works. But why don't you read the content you yourself link? It's explained in the cited article. You can answer your own question.

 

[Metaphor]

It has everything to do with whether the story about what Britain did wrong is going to be told, or supplanted by a story only about what it did right.

Are we to imagine Cousens, and millions of others of her bent, won't be around to tell everyone exactly what they think Britain did wrong?

Is the argument that the general public is so effervescently stupid that, without constant examples of Britain's failures, unalloyed by accurate stories about its successes, people won't be able to recognise her failures at all?

Bad analogy. Traffic jams don't kill 10000s of people.

Of course you think it's a bad analogy, because you don't like the implications.

A better analogy is dams, and yes, we do regularly build dams designed to withstand a once-in-a-century or once-in-a-millennium flood.

Excellent. I assume that costs the same as building and staffing hospitals to withstand a once-in-a-century event.

It is deranged to worry "[Britain will] quickly forget the devastating delay of the UK government to take action", that they might "forget the lessons that the pandemic has taught us so far: that the UK and the US are in fact not exceptions at the global stage. That we are not only vulnerable but can also afford to learn lessons from countries, regardless of whether we have a special relationship with them", that "the key lesson of coronavirus: international cooperation saves lives" might not get the attention it deserves?

Yes. It's deranged to think that Britain discovering the vaccine will lead to that, and it's deranged to think that even if it did lead to that, that the thousands of lives lost every day a vaccine is undiscovered is worth the trade-off.

Which part of her article makes you conclude that she doesn't? Anything at all? If anything, she's worried that politics might try to monopolise the vaccine in a way that's offensive and alien to the culture of international cooperation in which the researchers are working, thus making it less accessible.

The part of the article that is the entire article.

Does she actually believe that the scientists at Oxford would not immediately submit their discovery to international peer review? Does she actually think that Britain discovering a vaccine first will mean that fewer vaccines will be manufactured and distributed?

Does she actually think this? It seems she does, and that makes her deranged. Or perhaps just ignorant.

 

[Jokodo]

Are we to imagine Cousens, and millions of others of her bent, won't be around to tell everyone exactly what they think Britain did wrong?

Is the argument that the general public is so effervescently stupid that, without constant examples of Britain's failures, unalloyed by accurate stories about its successes, people won't be able to recognise her failures at all?

For someone whose main hobby horse is how propaganda of a kind you don't like is causing the actual downfall of the West, you're surprisingly reluctant to accept the possibility that propaganda can shift the focus of public debate ever so subtly.

One might almost say you're being inconsistent.

Of course you think it's a bad analogy, because you don't like the implications.

It's a bad analogy because failure to meet demand spikes has nowhere near the same kind of consequences.

A better analogy is dams, and yes, we do regularly build dams designed to withstand a once-in-a-century or once-in-a-millennium flood.

Excellent. I assume that costs the same as building and staffing hospitals to withstand a once-in-a-century event.

It is deranged to worry "[Britain will] quickly forget the devastating delay of the UK government to take action", that they might "forget the lessons that the pandemic has taught us so far: that the UK and the US are in fact not exceptions at the global stage. That we are not only vulnerable but can also afford to learn lessons from countries, regardless of whether we have a special relationship with them", that "the key lesson of coronavirus: international cooperation saves lives" might not get the attention it deserves?

Yes. It's deranged to think that Britain discovering the vaccine will lead to that, and it's deranged to think that even if it did lead to that, that the thousands of lives lost every day a vaccine is undiscovered is worth the trade-off.

Again, reading failure. Where does she demand that Oxford researchers refrain from vaccine research? Even implicitly? She actually says that she is "[n]ot only proud, but hopeful and excited" - but that she also worries about how this might be instrumentalised. Those are not mutually exclusive.

Which part of her article makes you conclude that she doesn't? Anything at all? If anything, she's worried that politics might try to monopolise the vaccine in a way that's offensive and alien to the culture of international cooperation in which the researchers are working, thus making it less accessible.

The part of the article that is the entire article.

Does she actually believe that the scientists at Oxford would not immediately submit their discovery to international peer review? Does she actually think that Britain discovering a vaccine first will mean that fewer vaccines will be manufactured and distributed?

Does she actually think this? It seems she does, and that makes her deranged. Or perhaps just ignorant.

Again this is your reading comprehension failure speaking. Or maybe you didn't read the article before copy-pasting it?

 

[Metaphor]

For someone whose main hobby horse is how propaganda of a kind you don't like is causing the actual downfall of the West, you're surprisingly reluctant to accept the possibility that propaganda can shift the focus of public debate ever so subtly.

One might almost say you're being inconsistent.

So, yes? Yes, people are so effervescently stupid that in order to propogandise the public to her tastes, Cousens worries about examples of British excellence marring her narrative of British white male evilness. Okay.

It's a bad analogy because failure to meet demand spikes has nowhere near the same kind of consequences.

Your dam analogy is far worse--does building a dam at 5x a 'general' capacity cost the same as building and staffing a hospital to 5x some 'general' capacity?

Again, reading failure. Where does she demand that Oxford researchers refrain from vaccine research? Even implicitly? She actually says that she is "[n]ot only proud, but hopeful and excited" - but that she also worries about how this might be instrumentalised. Those are not mutually exclusive.

I read that paragraph that way at first too, but that conflicts with everything else in the article. I assume she is extending the idea in the previous paragraph "shouldn't I feel proud? And not only proud, but hopeful and excited?" When she says "shouldn't I?", it means she isn't.

Of course, it would be strange to feel proud anyway, since she isn't a scientist working on the vaccine and contributed nothing towards it, except to be worried about the maleness and whiteness of the team.

Again this is your reading comprehension failure speaking. Or maybe you didn't read the article before copy-pasting it?

She specifically writes about Britain hoarding the vaccine if it discovers it first. Britain won't and can't do that. She is deluded.

 

[Jokodo]

So, yes? Yes, people are so effervescently stupid that in order to propogandise the public to her tastes, Cousens worries about examples of British excellence marring her narrative of British white male evilness. Okay.

No. None of that. F in reading comprehension.

Your dam analogy is far worse--does building a dam at 5x a 'general' capacity cost the same as building and staffing a hospital to 5x some 'general' capacity?

No, it doesn't, and that would inform how we make sure we can rapidly expand capacities without too much cost. For example, I could imagine training more people for medical professions than who will actually work in them, and treating the remainder as a kind of "militia" that can be called upon in emergencies (and paying them a small nominal salary for their stand-by-duty while they work in other fields), as a cost-efficient alternative to permanently staffing for maximum demand. I could imagine subsidising companies producing ventilator or other to expand their production capacities (though not actual production until needed) in such a way as to be able to quickly respond in a surge in demand, instead of having hospitals stock 5 times the respirators they expect to ever need.

The analogy is however very much like the dam and quite unlike the highway in terms of the consequences of failing to meet peak demand, and I for one don't want to go back to where anything exceeding 120% average demand is tagged an irresponsible waste of tax money, or to a privatised health care system where it's slashed as eating away on profit potential.

Again, reading failure. Where does she demand that Oxford researchers refrain from vaccine research? Even implicitly? She actually says that she is "[n]ot only proud, but hopeful and excited" - but that she also worries about how this might be instrumentalised. Those are not mutually exclusive.

I read that paragraph that way at first too, but that conflicts with everything else in the article.

No, it doesn't. Normal people realise that you can be hopeful about a vaccine and worried about how it might get instrumentalised at the same time.

I assume she is extending the idea in the previous paragraph "shouldn't I feel proud? And not only proud, but hopeful and excited?" When she says "shouldn't I?", it means she isn't.

Of course, it would be strange to feel proud anyway, since she isn't a scientist working on the vaccine and contributed nothing towards it, except to be worried about the maleness and whiteness of the team.

Again this is your reading comprehension failure speaking. Or maybe you didn't read the article before copy-pasting it?

She specifically writes about Britain hoarding the vaccine if it discovers it first. Britain won't and can't do that. She is deluded.

So reading comprehension failure it is. The point about the threat of hoarding is directly sourced to a nature feature: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-01063-8

 

[Arctish]

No, it doesn't, and that would inform how we make sure we can rapidly expand capacities without too much cost. For example, I could imagine training more people for medical professions than who will actually work in them, and treating the remainder as a kind of "militia" that can be called upon in emergencies (and paying them a small nominal salary for their stand-by-duty while they work in other fields), as a cost-efficient alternative to permanently staffing for maximum demand.

That would actually work quite well with the National Guard here in the US. The Governors of each State call their National Guard units to active duty during times of emergency. We could heavily emphasize medical and emergency first responder training in those units rather than they usual Army soldier training they receive, and be much more prepared to respond to a pandemic than we are right now.

 

[Elixir]

I find it hard to believe that Boris Johnson would take personal credit for a vaccine success developed by scientists at Oxford.

Good point. No way would he get any credit with the fat orange idiot dancing all over the stage yelling ME ME ME!!!

 

[Metaphor]

No, it doesn't, and that would inform how we make sure we can rapidly expand capacities without too much cost. For example, I could imagine training more people for medical professions than who will actually work in them, and treating the remainder as a kind of "militia" that can be called upon in emergencies (and paying them a small nominal salary for their stand-by-duty while they work in other fields), as a cost-efficient alternative to permanently staffing for maximum demand. I could imagine subsidising companies producing ventilator or other to expand their production capacities (though not actual production until needed) in such a way as to be able to quickly respond in a surge in demand, instead of having hospitals stock 5 times the respirators they expect to ever need.

Oh, I see. And Oxford successfully discovering a vaccine first will prevent this. And no country in the world does this already because?

The analogy is however very much like the dam and quite unlike the highway in terms of the consequences of failing to meet peak demand, and I for one don't want to go back to where anything exceeding 120% average demand is tagged an irresponsible waste of tax money, or to a privatised health care system where it's slashed as eating away on profit potential.

Oh, I see. And Oxford successfully discovering a vaccine first will prevent this.

So reading comprehension failure it is. The point about the threat of hoarding is directly sourced to a nature feature: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-01063-8

Her argument is a non-starter. Some country must discover the vaccine first. Whoever discovers it first is completely irrelevant, unless that country keeps it a secret. Is she proposing Britain will keep it a secret?

She is worried that Britain will manufacture vaccines and then want to use them in Britain. The horror! Will this prevent other countries manufacturing vaccines?

What does she think? That Britain is uniquely evil in its desire to actually use the vaccines it manufactures? Or does she think any country that discovers this will hoard it, and she'd prefer some country other than Britain manufactures vaccines and hoards it for itself?

 

[laughing dog]

She specifically writes about Britain hoarding the vaccine if it discovers it first.

Whether she is correct or not in her speculations will ultimately be a question of fact.

Britain won't and can't do that.

Once again, you confuse your opinion with fact, because there is no way for you to know.

She is deluded.

Given the tenor of your straw man driven hyperbolic OP, it is clear she is not alone in delusion.