Instead of competing bids, US & Germany should be pooling funds for a cure, and carrying out the research wherever the firm feels is most time/$ efficient.
If anything, the agreement should be conditional on vaccine being distributed to all funding countries, in order of some index of global health priority.
I'm not loving this, especially since things haven't even gotten as bad as they're likely to get.
It is times like this that make it quite salient how inefficient our systems can be when competition is the primary economic motivator. With things like climate change or space travel, the ill effects of competition over cooperation can be easier to hide from. A global pandemic forces the issue though, and petty nationalism and self-serving competitiveness are exposed plainly as detrimental to the species as a whole.
On a smaller scale the TP hoarding is of a similar phenomenon. Scarcity, even when it isn't actually there, drives us all and thus we fulfill the scarcity we were afraid of.
Of course we'll cooperate. Even Trump can't end that. It might take him leaving before the Europeans start trusting us again (with a lot of justification).
But I don't want one solution. I want multiple well funded investigations of different vaccines, all in testing, so when a problem is found with one we still have alternatives.
This is unfortunately fake news, if you read the Reuters report they cite as evidence there is no mention of exclusivity just funding. In fact the exact opposite is said.
> The U.S. government has spoken with many (more than 25) companies that claim they can help with a vaccine. Most of these companies already received seed funding from U.S. investors... any solution found would be shared with the world
According to [Die Welt], Trump was trying to get the Tübingen-based
CureVac company — which also has sites in Frankfurt and Boston — to
move its research wing to the United States and develop the vaccine “for the
U.S. only.” ... On Sunday afternoon, Germany’s Health Ministry told
Reuters that its spokesperson had been quoted correctly in the newspaper
article, confirming that Washington had attempted to take over the
biopharmaceutical company. Government sources indicated that Berlin
was now offering CureVac financial incentives to remain in Germany.
it's not fake news. Please read the updated article from the link you posted above:
> Welt am Sonntag also quoted an unidentified German government source as saying Trump was trying to secure the scientists’ work exclusively, and would do anything to get a vaccine for the United States, “but only for the United States.”
Yeah, so there is an unsubstantiated german government source and then the very next sentence the company denies it themselves:
>CureVac issued a statement on Sunday, in which it said: “The company rejects current rumors of an acquisition”.
Finally they give a quote from a US rep:
> The U.S. government has spoken with many (more than 25) companies that claim they can help with a vaccine. Most of these companies already received seed funding from U.S. investors... any solution found would be shared with the world
Not sure why you are being downvoted. A statement by the company itself saying it's false is a lot more valuable than a newspaper using anonymous source.
why would you work together with the US? They would steal and patent the results in the end or just claim that they invented it because they're the best country anyway and "America First".
If the US politics don't change they will be left behind by Europe and China. I know that there are also a lot of US people who don't like Trump, but those people need to step up. Why is nobody protesting? Why isn't there a big Anti-Trump movement? The whole country is either cheering or watching it happen in shock
Edit: you also broke the guidelines with a personal attack here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22341594. If I had seen it at the time, I would have replied. We ban accounts that post comments like these, so please don't.
There is a big anti-trump movement, but people are unwilling/afraid to protest on the streets. The US has traditionally suppressed protest movements, consider for example occupy WS and Black Lives Matter.
Neither of those movements were "suppressed". That's an extraordinary claim and I'd love to see some evidence. Last time I checked, OWS went on unabated until it collapsed under its own weight due to no clear direction or leadership. BLM continues to this day and performs protests all over the country, some of which have resulted in violence and rioting, yet are not touched by most cities.
There are a lot of people, myself included, that don't like Donald Trump, but it is just factually untrue to say that the US is suppressing protests. It's more accurate to say most people are more focused on waking up in the morning, getting to work, and feeding their families than whatever shenanigans are happening around them.
"Throughout our country’s history, the federal government has used the fear of threats – real or perceived – to conduct surveillance on domestic groups and people who look or act different. Civil rights and anti-Vietnam War activists in the 1960s and 1970s, American Muslim civil rights leaders and academics post-9/11, and the FBI’s recent, expansive racial, religious, and ethnic mapping program are a handful of examples.
Modern protest movements speak, associate, and organize through social media. Their tweets, blogs, protests, marches, and die-ins are the trumpets by which they call for reform and social justice. Government monitoring of activists’ protests – simply because these activists dissent and without any evidence of wrongdoing – threatens to discourage them from speaking, associating, and expressing as is their right under the First Amendment. Surveillance of #BlackLivesMatter protests also opens the door to racial profiling because the movement is Black-led."
I agree with you that those things happen and are wrong. However, they don't meet the bar of "suppression". Suppression is an action, it's an active thing.
When China arrests doctors for posting on social media about a new disease or when they fire tear gas at people and beat them with clubs while they are protesting peacefully on the streets in Hong Kong, THAT is suppression. It's also a problem that we live in a massive world of surveillance enabled by commercial entities and exploited by governments, but that is not in itself a form of suppression.
If you were to consider this suppression, then technically we are all suppressed in our everyday lives from nearly any activity or statement which dissents from the norm. Meanwhile, over here in reality I'm well known among friends and coworkers as being a cranky guy who dissents about nearly everything for good reasons that most people are too busy with their lives to care about.
Hanlon's Razor feels like it's necessary to be invoked, or at least a corollary here. No shadowy conspiracy makes protest movements in the US ineffective, what makes them ineffective is that the average American is /just, barely/ comfortable enough in their daily life to not consider it worth it to join. Even when people are uncomfortable, they fear losing what little they have on a slim promise of change if they join a protest movement.
My statements are not to laud the state of the US or the actions of our government, just to defend the sanctity of meaning behind our words.
I don't think they are afraid. There have been a series of protests. When he was first starting in office there was a march for science,for example, I went to that one. I (like many others, I'm not special) at the 2016 election I left my city and went out in the countryside to door bell for a us representative in a close race, turning over the seat to dems - that was a little scary.
But I'd like for there to be public demonstrations, I was hoping somebody else would organize. I should have done something of course. Now it's too late, at least a little unsafe to assemble in large crowds.
It would be a mistake to conflate "America" and "Americans" with the current administration, generally. There are a lot of good people doing good work that I'm sure would also collaborate and share a global solution to this problem.
Also, FWIW there is a considerable anti-Trump movement. You may remember he was recently impeached by the House of Representatives.
I agree the current admin has made the US an uncredible ally.
That said, Trump has been the most unpopular president in US history, and there is a huge resistance movement. The president has been impeached, and according to Generic Ballot polling, more people are willing to not vote for his party each day.
Sounds like someone is in a bubble, RCP polling aggregate data shows Trump (before this crisis) at an all time high for popularity, and more popular than Obama at the end of his first term.
There is a resistance movement only on the coasts of the US, and in some other Urban, largely democrat area's get out of Urban US and there is no resistance, at most it is slight disagreement, but most people in rural America support Trump completely this includes many in the "Rust Belt" which democrats need to win a national election, support they have completely and utterly lost
RCP shows Trump's approval level has been below Obama's except for one period of about 4 months at the end of 2019, where they about tracked each other. Trump's disapproval level has consistently been 5-10% above Obama's, except for a couple of periods where Obama's disapproval spiked a bit for a few weeks. It never went above Trump's average disapproval though.
Interesting, where did you see that on RCP? On 538, it clearly shows Obama (and most other presidents, with the exception of H.W Bush) had a higher approval rating 1158 days into their presidency - https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/trump-approval-ratings/....
You should know this is fake news, if you read the Reuters report they cite as evidence there is no mention of exclusivity just funding. In fact the exact opposite is said.
> The U.S. government has spoken with many (more than 25) companies that claim they can help with a vaccine. Most of these companies already received seed funding from U.S. investors... any solution found would be shared with the world
"On March 2, CureVac's then-CEO Daniel Menichella attended a meeting at the White House to discuss coronavirus vaccine development with Trump and members of his coronavirus taskforce.
On March 11, the company announced Menichella would be replaced by company founder Ingmar Hoerr, without giving a reason why."
Why would the company need to exclusively sell to the US? Is the supply expected to be limited? Once the drug is discovered, can't it be licensed around the world for mass production?
The very fact that we are discussing this is super silly and shitty. The whole world should be working together, not competing with each other and not trying to screw each other over.
China is going to win this. USA mishandles the pandemic, blocks the EU-US transit way after it could help anything, and now pulls stunts like this. Meanwhile, China is restarting their economy, and is scoring points by sending teams of doctors and hundreds of tons of medical equipment to countries around the world, including two in EU.
When the dust settles, I think Europe may end up reconsidering who to side with.
China is run by an authoritarian extreme nationalistic government that tortures its citizen that dare to critise it. That is widely known. Europe will stay a close ally with the USA and the cooperation will resume to normality once the USA has recovered from its recent personality cult and government running on lies.
None of this however is relevant in this context - what is relevant is that even with 3 months of warnings western democracies utterly failed to prepare.
We love our freedom and our ideals but our execution sucks and it has nothing to do with China being authoritarian at this point.
Taiwan is a democracy and they handled it just fine.
No, we have elected clowns who tell us sweet lies we want to hear rather than the information we need to adapt to a changing world and now we have the worst aspects of both systems. Shit, in the US the local officials wanted to do the right thing while the dear leader screwed around blocking them, dismissed the scientists and acting uncontrolled and unchecked supported by his blindly loyal party officials and supported by his quasi-state-TV channel - that's like reverse China, the stupid version. We are really not in any position to give lectures right now.
So let's stop shouting China is bad reflexively whenever our own faults are kicking us in the ass and actually demonstrate that our system is better - because right now, it is not - and a lot more people are about to die because of it.
And right next there is a whole host of other risks queued up that will hit us in the same way- antibiotics resistance, resource exhaustion, pensions, climate change, etc. If this was the preview of how we will adapt to these challenges - ignoring them and letting them wash over us to not inconvenience the existing economy - I think China has a much better chance of adapting right now than we have.
We are lucky in a way to get this virus as a reality check and not something worse... but even this will leave millions dead, many unnecessary due to lack of preparation during the time paid for with the lives of many people in Wuhan and failure to heed science.
This is very well phrased. I've been thinking similar thoughts, but it's hard to put them into words. Democracy and freedom of expression is fantastic, but this crisis reveals the failings of modern democracy in a spectacular fashion.
Especially in the places that have had the most spectacular demonstrations of this recently; the UK and the USA. It's tragic, but as you said, this is a mild wakeup call. Hope it's heeded, but I'm not too optimistic.
Is this sarcasm? Because, honestly, at this point I can not tell.
Yes, China is doing terrible things – and also many good things. So is the US.
Of course as citizens of the western world it's easier to connect with western governments, weigh more heavily against the atrocities of the others and brush over our own systems shortcomings.
China imprisons people who criticized the covid19 effort, they arrested doctors. Did you know that docs or researchers put the covid19 sequence on the web (it was used by the seattle flu study to identify cv here), then arrested them.
The us doesn't do that kind of thing (trump would no doubt like to do that, with his talk of making cv numbers an official secret). China was very effective stopping the virus apparently, after screwing it up at the start. They just kidnapped a critical billionaire.
That 'whistleblower doctor' was reprimanded, not arrested. The Chinese supreme court later judged in his favor, saying that the police shouldn't have reprimanded him. Even CGTN, a state media, admitted that the treatment of the doctor was wrong.
The US might recover in the sense of electing someone less clownish but I don't see this economic mercantilist trend in the US subsiding because it is gaining steam on both sides of the political spectrum. Warren for example, championing 'economic patriotism' has similar impulses and withdrawing from the world is now an equally liberal and conservative position.
Yeah, "widely known". What is less widely known is that that isn't as true as you think.
Case study: https://mothership.sg/2019/12/news-china-protests-wenlou-hua...
People in Guangdong province -- closely Hong Kong -- protested against the building of a crematorium. They also complained that the government didn't consult them before proceeding with the plans. Some even rioted, similarly to Hong Kongers. Did the government put them in jail forever? Nope: peaceful protesters were unharmed, rioters got jailed but were released later and forgiven. The government scrapped the plans and gave citizens what they wanted.
How is this possible in an authoritarian country? There is only one answer: your image of what China is, is wrong.
There is a core of truth of all the claims about authoritarianism and human rights abuse, but it's just that: a core. That core has been exaggerated beyond all reason.
Like someone else posted: china has good aspects and bad aspects. Just like the US. Just like other countries. Time to stop viewing it as a caricature and start treating it for what it really is.
China’s handling of this is the reason we are all in this situation. They had a chance to contain it and they chose to shut down information that would have stopped the spread. Now the Chinese government are some kind of heroes?
I really don't get this sentiment. China fucked up their initial handling of the situation, but it took over a month for them to figure out that they're dealing with a dangerous new pathogen. These things aren't apparent from the first few cases that get discovered. Meanwhile, the rest of the world had two months of warning about the danger, and we fucked up worse. Blaming China for not containing it is ridiculous and completely unfair - I doubt anyone would've fared better. US handling of the situation in particular proves it would fare even worse (complete with suppression of data).
How do you know that Germany isn't already trying to screw over the USA and the rest of the world? One of the first things they did is block mask exports to the rest of Europe.
Why do you think that’s screwing over somebody, rather than rationally protecting the very limited supply already insufficient for Germany’s own imminent need?
Please explain how that'd advantage the US? The US spent hundreds of billions of dollars to restart the German economy and rebuild Europe post-WW2 as part of the Marshall Plan. Modern Europe nearly owes its existence to the herculean efforts of Americans. There is absolutely no reason we'd try to stifle or damage Europe now. We are allies.
Good point on Marshall Plan. But "Modern Europe nearly owes its existence to the herculean efforts of Americans" - really? If you're talking about ww2, Soviet union had a far more important role to play. https://www.vox.com/2014/6/16/5814270/the-successful-70-year...
When does this myth die? 70 years, is this version still taught where you went to school (US?)?
"hundreds of billions of dollars"
Germany received $14B (in 2020 $). Most of the money was loans and Germany made the last debt payment in 1971.
The Marshall plan had three goals: 1.) Start the US peace time economy and help transition companies from wartime production to consumer goods 2.) Prevent communist influence in Europe by preventing starving Europeans 3.) Open European markets to US companies by reducing barriers and regulations.
"The Marshall Plan aid was mostly used for the purchase of goods from the United States." --Wikipedia
"Its role in the rapid recovery has been debated. The Marshall Plan's accounting reflects that aid accounted for about 3% of the combined national income of the recipient countries between 1948 and 1951, which means an increase in GDP growth of less than half a percent." --Wikipedia
That aside grateful to every US soldier who risked his life or lost his life to free Europe, especially those that gave chocolates to my starving parents. They can always have a free lunch here.
A common forgotten point is that they spend that money partially because they had to it else they could not have guaranteed that Europe would not align with communism. At the same time doing so saved the USA from a economical crash caused by overproduction. Lastly it allowed them to gain deep tried economical influence.
While the USA might sometimes to present it as a selfless act it wasn't selfless at all. It was what allowed them to become the most powerful country in the word, at least for a view years.
Lastly Trump didn't just want to buy right on the potential vaccines he wanted to get exclusive rights. It was never even a question before that if the EU finds a vaccine then the USA will get it, too. But now he did an action which completely destroy the trust between the EU and the USA when it comes to fighting this pandemic together.
Yeah, isn't the point of a vaccine to immunize as many people as possible, not just those in one country? If you don't immunize globally it won't work as well. This administration has pulled a lot of dumb stunts but this one might take the cake.
Please share your data and calculations for this claim. I understand how exponential growth works, and I realize there is an incubation period, but this really just feels like unnecessary fear mongering considering we're at less than 6000 deaths worldwide as of now.
I agree it's hyperbolic, but the numbers are staggering and quoting the current deaths are really misleading in this respect. This will affect small percentages of everyone. A million deaths world wide, with a disease that is expected to reach 60+% of the population is not much. It's the difference in the death rate of 0.02%. In other words, if a sufficiently early intervention manages to reduce the death rate from 1% to 0.98%, that's a million lifes saved.
However, the sensitive dependence on initial conditions only applies to things that happen during exponential growth. By the time a vaccine hits (according to many reputable sources about a year from now) we will be in a very different stage of the disease anyway.
..and it should come years from now. Hearing some researchers talk about fast tracking a SARS-cov2 vaccine in 18 ~24 months seems terribly unsafe. Vaccines need extensive animal testing following by phased human trials, less we have a repeat of the Lyme disease vaccine.
General vaccines for Corona virus families should have started years ago. H1N1 had a vaccine because it was a known flu that was researched previously. It was just the ramp-up/production time that was the issue there.
The Lyme disease vaccine:
"By 2001, 1.4 million doses of the vaccine had been distributed, but the FDA’s Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System only picked up on 59 reports of arthritis."
Rates of arthritis roughly at population baseline level.
People who talk about going through the motions of 2 years of animal trials have zero perspective. In wartime, this pedantry needs to be chucked our the window. Do the high yield human tests asap using heroic volunteers, and do it fast.
Moving too fast and not being careful could be what gave us Covid-19. If it comes out that it was a product of SARS/MERS research then the tone of these "move fast" conversations will certainly change.
Supplies for vaccinces of any kind are always subject to constraints and so deliveries are prioritized by the highest bidder. I know for example the flu vaccine gets delivered to the US and Japan first from a certain French pharmaceutical because they pay (by far) the highest prices. Of all G7 countries, Canada pays the least for the flu vaccine so they get the the vaccines last.
This so much! The technology to built such a vaccine will not be that complex, its only the information about what works and is safe that is expensive. Who ever thinks otherwise has no idea of how big pharma works and why it is expensive.
That's not what I mean. There is no need for Trump to do this; once someone develops a vaccine then they should be able to license it for a normal fee.
The US have a massive army of chickens ready to produce eggs which are used to produce vaccines in the order of millions per month. They just need the vaccine and they can produce it.
It's unfortunately fake news, if you read the Reuters report they cite as evidence there is no mention of exclusivity just funding. In fact the exact opposite is said.
> The U.S. government has spoken with many (more than 25) companies that claim they can help with a vaccine. Most of these companies already received seed funding from U.S. investors... any solution found would be shared with the world
it's not fake news. Please read the updated article from the link you posted above:
> Welt am Sonntag also quoted an unidentified German government source as saying Trump was trying to secure the scientists’ work exclusively, and would do anything to get a vaccine for the United States, “but only for the United States.”
Yeah, so there is an unsubstantiated german government source and then the very next sentence the company denies it themselves:
>CureVac issued a statement on Sunday, in which it said: “The company rejects current rumors of an acquisition”.
Finally they give a quote from a US rep:
> The U.S. government has spoken with many (more than 25) companies that claim they can help with a vaccine. Most of these companies already received seed funding from U.S. investors... any solution found would be shared with the world
The company CureVac only denied rumours that it will be bought, it did nor deny claims that the Trump administration approached them and tried to buy exclusive access to the vaccine.
Neither is losing your population and losing votes to far-right political parties just because you didn't want to upset America. Other EU countries would also side with Germany on that, I suppose.
Doesn't matter anyways since it was reported a few minutes ago, that the vaccine patent is not for sale to the US once available.
They can. They could ban the trade deal of the vaccine or the IP. They could even nationalize the company, but I don't think that's very likely. The Company is already working together with a government owned health institute so it is possible that they share already some IPs
God I’m glad that Bavaria is pretty much under lockdown starting tomorrow, because I’m not sure I’d want to show my American* face in public right now.
*I blend in really well - until I open my mouth and Texas-accented German comes out.
nah don't worry we might have a slight anti-american streak when it comes to global politics but I don't think I've ever seen personal sentiment against Americans as individuals (other than maybe badly behaved soldiers stationed on military bases)
You're lucky you're in Bavaria, though. Germany apparently has 25,000 intensive care beds with respirators. The country I currently live in has less than a thousand.
In recent years (beginning with Bush II, I'd say), we've felt much colder towards America the country, but I don't see or hear much dislike for Americans.
It certainly helps that the Americans we come into contact here are mostly what counts as liberal in America.
And those who aren't (I was certainly surprised to find out that my friend and colleague from Connecticut was a Republican with Tea Party sympathies) are courteous without fail and don't run around telling us how they feel about free speech or gun control in Germany.
As an American, we are inspired by German people and their talent, I've personally spent a lot of time with German suppliers. We will kick our president out in the next election cycle, hope to rebond our diplomatic ties with EU.
US-EU ties goes far back into the 20th century. Last 4 years has been tough. Apologies, but I hope people know that this is not what the city dwellers and liberal population of America thinks.
The 80% shareholder (which was a co-founder of SAP and ironically a very controversial person in German football) just send a press release out (German):
"Walldorf, 15. März 2020 – Die dievini Hopp BioTech holding GmbH & Co. KG, eine Beteiligungsgesellschaft von SAP-Mitgründer Dietmar Hopp mit Investitionsschwerpunkt in innovative Biotechnologieunternehmen, nimmt Stellung zu Presseberichten über eine vermeintliche exklusive Vergabe eines in der Entwicklung befindlichen Impfstoffs von CureVac gegen das Corona-Virus. dievini ist seit 2005 an der CureVac AG, Tübingen, beteiligt an der sie über 80% der Anteile hält. Zweitgrößter Aktionär ist die Bill-und-Melinda-Gates-Stiftung, die gemeinsam mit CureVac Impfstoffe gegen eine Reihe von Infektionserkrankungen entwickelt.
„Seit wir 2005 dievini gründeten, bin ich davon überzeugt, dass das Verstehen molekularer Zusammenhänge Diagnose und Therapie auch schwerster Erkrankungen für Patienten weltweit transformativ verbessern wird“, sagt Dietmar Hopp. „Dem Ziel, alle Menschen vor Infektionen zu schützen und Patienten weltweit besser therapieren und im besten Fall heilen zu können, bin ich ebenso verpflichtet, wie meiner Absicht, nachhaltige innovative Infrastruktur und Arbeitsplätze in Deutschland zu schaffen. Wenn es uns hoffentlich bald gelingt, einen wirksamen Impfstoff gegen das Corona-Virus zu entwickeln, soll dieser Menschen nicht nur regional sondern solidarisch auf der ganzen Welt erreichen, schützen und helfen können. Ich wäre froh, wenn dies durch meine langjährigen Investitionen aus Deutschland heraus erfolgen würde.“
----
The most important point is the last sentence: If we are sucessful finding a vaccine, it shouldnt be available only regionally but for all people worldwide.
Interesting. This might get Dietmar Hopp rehabilitated in the football community. Fans called him (translated ideomatically) "bastard" for the last few weeks because of his (alleged illegal) investments into his own football club.
When many comments break side guidelines and the thread is wretched, then that feels odd and usual for me for HN. Probably you see more threads like this and it isn't unusual, but for me it feels not at all what I expect and relate to what I think happens on HN. This speaks for the quality of this site. Thanks for the info!
Alas, we do see a lot of threads like this, way too many to feel so great about this place. But it does feel good to hear from a user to whom it is unusual.
This might be a clear case of a selection bias. When the quality of threads goes down, I tend to stay away from them and the moderators need to interact more with it. When a thread has a fantastic quality, I feel a urge to interact with it, to read it, while the moderation is not needed.
Odd and unusual? It matches the political climate of the US. We have a largely despised president with a small following of fanatics. This is what it looks like reflected on social media sites like HN.
As distastrious as it might be that this may be part now of US American culture, it doesn't need to start happening here nor be tolerated. The nature of this place is that we can talk with reason and share facts based on evidence. If people seek to disturb that, for whatever reason, I advocate for corresponding moderation.
> The nature of this place is that we can talk with reason and share facts based on evidence.
This has been the utopia of the tech nerd mentality for over 30 years since I first started using UseNet. The reality is, this kind "reasoned and fact-based" discussion model (a) doesn't really exist when there are subjective components or unknowably complexities, but worse (b) it is actually used to suppress discussion! The number of times I've observed discussion with people using "logic" to gatekeep is uncountable.
The fact of the matter is: some topics are messy and you can't just throw around "logic" and make it go away. Well, you can sequester yourself, but good luck with that.
I think the odd and unusual thing was that for a long time comments were mostly against the president and those comments were mostly being downvoted but now comments and votes look more correlated.
It might be that people genuinely dislike discussion of politics on here even on a thread that is about politics or that Trump's supporters here are more likely to have downvote buttons.
CureVac's main investor is Dietmar Hopp. He's one of the founders of SAP and 8th richest German at the moment. He's also been known to donate large amounts of money, just recently he gifted $100 million to build a new center for heart surgery in Heidelberg.
Long story short, I would not expect him to be convinced by anything monetary at this point in his life. He's a class act and would probably be embarrassed to be helping Trump.
He's also much deserving of the success he's having with this venture here, to my understanding he kept many biotech firms alive when the going got though.
I am not sure why it was flagged, but the Reuters article was edited after publication without a notice of such a change. Specifically the following can no longer be found in the article.
> Contacted by Reuters, a spokeswoman for the German Health Ministry said: "We confirm the report in the Welt am Sonntag."
One possibility is using sanctions to decide which country can have the vaccine.
The assumption is the virus will naturally spread, so controlling which country gets or doesn’t get the vaccine is a form of an indirect biological warfare.
There is already efforts to block European countries from sending medicine to Iran as an example [0].
What we should be thinking about is at what point are we going too far with these strong-arming tactics. Outside of humanitarian arguments, there is the possibility that leaving the virus unchecked, it will ultimately find its way to our shores.
To put a positive light on this disturbing news, I, like many here, am deeply grateful to the scientists and engineers (including at CureVac) working tirelessly around the clock and around the world to help develop a vaccine, save millions of lives, and let us all return to normal life.
I'm sick with something viral at the moment, and I hope to do my part by social distancing, disinfecting public surfaces I'm touching, and working pretty much exclusively from home. Flatten the curve, and let those who truly need it take the ICU beds and hospital spaces. One way or another, it'll be over before we know it :)
US-EU ties are a much deeper than what the current US president has stirred up. What an embarrassment. Give 8 months and perhaps have a new president and things may turn for the better. I vividly recall the support and warm of the people of Europe, their messages and prayers during the 9/11 attack.
When we must cooperate with others, we must look for common principles, underlying foundation of a country. China can become a super power bully around other countries into a dystopian world. Is that what we want in Germany? German companies having to apologize to the CCP for offending them?
My theory around the election of Trump through a number of incidents that lead up to it - Russian objectives to dismantle US-EU, Chinese objectives to bankcrupt US by paying off their executives to move the factories to China, Democrats vs Republicans polarization and Trump dropping the American credibility. It is sad. Remember, Trump didn't win popular vote. When middle America is bankrupt, there is no food on the table, drug use is through the roof - they will want some change in Washington, Trump gets elected. I don't want my kids to grow up to a world where democracy is dying, western countries are infighting and there is an increasing risk of complete and utter lack of freedom, loss of privacy and obsolence of liberty.
What a sad world to be in. China can be amazing super power if it suddenly got rid of CCP and had an open minded democracy, inspiring and building a model of how other nations can follow. Instead, we are seeing a regression and nationalism rising around the world. Same thing in India.
The fundamental problem is that the narrative of the current administration is that globalization and global co-operation has been bad for the United States and that this policy has resulted in the U.S. being taken advantage of.
However, the correct response to this pandemic would go against this narrative completely. It is a common foe faced by all nations, and is an ideal situation for being tackled through global co-operation!
The current administration is continuing to try to solve this problem without turning to global co-operation. If the vaccine is developed in Germany, or the UK or China, the U.S. would then need to license this technology, and it would reveal that the U.S does in fact need the world, and that global co-operation is, at the very least, needed in some situations. It would lose face. If on the other hand, the administration can claim "Look! We developed the vaccine here in the U.S. .. I told you we didn't need those other guys. We will take care of Americans first, and then we will help the others." then it would validate the "America first" narrative.
To anyone either naive or cynical about global governance and wondering why we don't all cooperate, I recommend this book: "Governing the World: The History of an Idea, 1815 to Present" by Mark Mazower https://books.google.com/books/about/Governing_the_World.htm...
These behaviors are not new. The attitude the current American administration has towards the idea of global governance is an old attitude, and will prevent cooperation. This will not be the last time you see something similar in the news, and there will be no change unless the administration fundamentally changes its beliefs (read: the administration changes).
Yeah and if you actually read the Reuters report it says the exact opposite of this business insider drivel.
> The U.S. government has spoken with many (more than 25) companies that claim they can help with a vaccine. Most of these companies already received seed funding from U.S. investors... any solution found would be shared with the world
Just because those companies say that doesn't mean the Trump administration doesn't think it can buy an exclusive cure for itself. That they can't doesn't matter as much as they appear to be trying.
The Welt am Sonntag report says "US-Präsident Donald Trump versucht offenbar, deutsche Wissenschaftler, die an einem potenziellen Corona-Impfstoff arbeiten, mit hohen finanziellen Zuwendungen nach Amerika zu locken beziehungsweise das Medikament exklusiv für sein Land zu sichern." which Google Translate assures me means "US President Donald Trump apparently tries to lure German scientists working on a potential corona vaccine to America with high financial donations or to secure the drug exclusively for his country."
And the German health ministry confirmed the Welt story to Reuters.
Right they confirmed that the US has been reaching out to companies to supply funding, which is what I just quoted. There is no evidence other than anonymous sources that the Trump admin was looking for an 'exclusive' cure only for the US.
This article is incorrect. This company already has a large footprint in the United States in Boston, which is the epicenter of much of the covid effort. In addition, it's backed by the Bill and Melinda gates foundation (which apparently has a stake in the company).
The same rumors are going around about China buying US companies.
This kind of mob-raising by the media happens in every pandemic, and it does result in people being killed. Knock this shit off until the facts are in.
If you want not to contribute to mob behavior, please provide corrective information without adding inflammatory rhetoric of your own. Otherwise it's just a game of hot potato.
The facts are in. The German government acknowledged reports and said it is engaged in talks. The company reacted and fired the responsible CEO on 2020-03-11, per the companies website. Before you judge reports, look at the available evidence.
The fact that the company is also in Boston is also reported in the German article. That's besides the point though. The real story in this is that reportedly the US Government was/is looking to secure _exclusive_ access.
> “The German government is very interested in ensuring that vaccines and active substances against the new coronavirus are also developed in Germany and Europe,” a Health Ministry spokeswoman said
That doesn’t sound like they’re confirming exclusive access. In fact, the quote sounds like they’re explicitly going out of their way to not say that.
Where is the evidence that the US would have exclusive access? Had there ever been a US produced drug that the government refused to allow being sold to other countries?
Even if we get a vaccine, production rates for vaccines are going to be insufficient.
Let's say we get a working vaccine and have initial production of 50k doses per week, ramping up. How do you allocate those around the world? 50k per week is enough to get healthcare workers and start firebreaks in the US, but not much of an impact worldwide.
I think no matter how you allocate limited vaccine doses there are going to be a lot of people and nations upset. And I'm guessing the country where it is developed has a disproportionate degree of control of these decisions.
He did this same sh*t with NASA, called in the director and offered him any budget necessary to get a launch to the moon in time for re-election campaign.
> Trump was trying to secure the scientists’ work exclusively, and would do anything to get a vaccine for the United States, “but only for the United States.”
At this point, I wouldn't be surprised if Trump's goal was to get everyone to dislike the US, out of some misguided sense that "if you're good, everyone hates you, therefore if you make everyone hate you that means you're good".
Is he seriously trying to profiteer off the pandemic?
Probably he sees this as a way to win the election not about selling it for more money. He gets the vaccine and then trumps to his base that how americans only have the vaccine because america is so great etc and he got the vaccine for them.
USA is so far behind China and Europe in so many ways, I don’t think these type of dirty games are gonna make Americans feel better about themselves. It’s a dying society and it shows.
How many vaccines will be produced before September 15? Who will get the shots?
People talks about open sourcing and moral, but here we have phisical constraints, hard decisions will have to be done. In Italy they already do not intubate people older than 80, for example... Is not that doctors are evil, is that phisical world is limited.
Would pharmaceutical companies be able to protect any IP for a vaccine? I
mean wouldn’t governments just require a company that discovers a vaccine to quickly distribute the findings so every pharmaceutical company in the world can help manufacture it?
Gonna go out on a limb and say this is a (dumb) Trump ploy to get reelected. If only America has a vaccine, then in the run-up to the election he'd talk about how much better we're doing than the rest of the world and hope everyone forgets how badly his administration mismanaged the outbreak.
The exclusivity bit is what I was referring to. The only reason [1] to make it US-exclusive is to boost reelection prospects.
[1] There are other, way dumber possible reasons but I guess I'm trying to be charitable. He might not be able to wrap his head around positive-sum problems in general, or he might think that the US gains some advantage from all its trading partners having their economies destroyed.
Trump is more worried about the stock market and the economy. Two more weeks of blood in the stock market can crush his chances of being reelected. That's why, I think, he must be trying to get a few weeks advantage.
Do you have examples of where Trump isn’t that bad? And do you have them where it’s actually for sure he who is the one who makes the situation better? Not his advisors and others pushing it or him reacting to the backlash.
IE Europe flights ban not including U.K. but then including U.K. later. Based on your comment, I assume you could say that was all trump fixing to include the U.K. with no effect of others or the backlash affecting him. But maybe I’m wrong.
I'm pretty sure he is good at filling his own pockets, but not through normal means.
The wall - since he is in real estate, he would earn a lot of money by choosing the constructor
Oil - sidestepping official channels and trying to put known friend in place ( Ukraine) + Big fossile companies trying to change the path forward, protecting their current investments through all means
Russia - at least one country that is obvious to try to manipulate things with bribery
Tax cuts - guess why
Stocks - he is known for trying to manipulate stocks well before he was the president
Trump name in license - since almost all the rest of his business failed, he needs to act like he is a legend ( ps. He's just a dumb guy with a life-time of manipulation experience)
Daddy - since he is not smart enough to get it from zero
They confirmed they Trump offered them money to research in Vaccine in the US
Not that Trump wants the Vaccine "only for the US"
The truth, like with anything, is probably in the middle. In that what ever nation developed the vaccine their citizens will be the ones to get access to it first, logic dictates that if the vaccine is develop in Germany it will be distributed around Germany first, then other nations shortly there after (probably EU nations next, then the UK, then the US which could be weeks later). Most likely The American government would want that to happen in the US first.
If that weren't the case, so if the Trump administration just wanted to invest and also have access to the vaccine, this wouldn't be news and just business as usual, and everybody would benefit from it. Also, that would not get the CEO fired, and the German government wouldn't engage in talks in this case. So the evidence strongly suggests that the reports from multiple sources are indeed correct.
What logic ACTUALLY dictates is that once the vaccine is developed, the license to produce it is sold to all countries so that each country affected can begin mass producing it for their populations, and the global vaccine production capacity is utilized.
> The truth, like with anything, is probably in the middle
The story, really, isn't about truth. It's about trust. The German government clearly does not trust the USA to share a vaccine. And why would they? Everyone who's been watching US foreign policy for the last three years knows the "America First" bent of its chief executive. They know the kind of xenophobic stuff that gets said on its "state television station" every day. They can read polls, and know that the political base of the ruling party would genuinely cheer for a situation where the USA had exclusive access to a vaccine.
So they don't trust the US to control a biochem company. That's a problem, but it's not a problem with this particular event (realistically we're going to get a ton of vaccine variants from different labs -- vaccine development is hardly rocket surgery, as it were). It's a problem with the way US (really republican) foreign policy has been positioned in the modern world.
Well then I guess we are going to disagree on foreign policy, while I am not 100% on board with the "America First" train, I am also opposed to Globalism and losing American Sovereignty, trade deals that favor corporations and disfavor American Citizens, I also dont like my tax money being used to Secure and police other nations.
So far there is not much Trump as done in regards to foreign policy that I disagree with
> So far there is not much Trump as done in regards to foreign policy that I disagree with
Except for culturing a situation where one of our closest allies justifiably doesn't trust us to help them out, even in straightforward ways, in the biggest international crisis of the last 70 years, you mean.
We've come a fucking long way from the Berlin airlift, huh? The biggest disaster isn't Trump, really. It's the realization that his poison goes so deep in the american psyche. No one will think of us the same again.
This is more or less exactly what I meant. Once upon a time, the US was perceived as a world leader and a savior of last resort, by our own citizens as well as the world community. Now we're seeing another crisis, and our leaders and their followers insist, like you do, on viewing the whole thing through the lens of... unwanted immigration. Seriously?
Basically, we used to be the teachers in the schoolyard. Now we're a ramshackle fort of sneering kids trying to keep people out of "our" stuff.
Rather, where I live NO ONE could care less about your world leadership or whether you are or ever were the teachers, blah, blah, blah.
All of us out here will bitch and moan about the USA, but give anyone of us a ticket to the USA (especially if our family can come along) and we'll take it in a heartbeat.
The Welt am Sonntag report says "US-Präsident Donald Trump versucht offenbar, deutsche Wissenschaftler, die an einem potenziellen Corona-Impfstoff arbeiten, mit hohen finanziellen Zuwendungen nach Amerika zu locken beziehungsweise das Medikament exklusiv für sein Land zu sichern." which Google Translate assures me means "US President Donald Trump apparently tries to lure German scientists working on a potential corona vaccine to America with high financial donations or to secure the drug exclusively for his country."
The scenes in O'Hare last night were completely insane and the policy, beyond stupid. "Too stupid to be true" does not seem to be a valid rubric for this administration.
Some stupid and insane stories about him are certainly false, but many of them appear to be true.
It fits with everything we know about Trump, especially his xenophobic politics.
Worse, given his tendencies to punish his perceived political enemies, if such a vaccine were available before November 2020, it is very likely he would have restricted the drug to his supporters (i.e., political officials, donors, and Red states) in a blatant attempt to control the outcome of the election.
It isn't good enough for me, no. This is conjecture at best. Unidentified sources, quotes from a person paraphrasing what they heard Donald Trump say personally (or wanted to hear). This report does not meet the lowest standard for something I might consider believing.
In my humble opinion, given the gravity of the current situation, such "news stories" are in very poor taste. Im personally a whole lot more concerned about the oldest and youngest members of my family. What I don't need is some for-profit media entity trying to drive clicks like this right now.
Until January of 2021, Donald Trump is the President we have, for better or worse. The time to stop political nonsense has passed. This is not a time for division. There will be plenty of time for this BS later.
I don't think I understand your comment, but in case my meaning wasn't clear: bringing up that quote in this context and acting like it applies to one nation more than others is flamebait. Nothing good can come of that.
Why might doing this to a Chinese firm feel justified? (I understand this question doesn’t matter to Trump’s true believers.) Finding the vaccine had better to be international teamwork. China is the ground zero in this pandemic. It has a lot offer and lose. I would argue China is a big ally in this case.
EVERY country puts itself first. International cooperation happens either when they have capacity to spare, or when it is mutually beneficial. Your demonization of China based on its political system is based on stereotypes of what "evil communists/authoritarian states" are in theory, not on what they actually are in practice. China is not comparable to the Soviet Union.
Which words say things in China are still out of control, and why do you trust those words? I have family in China, if things are out of control instead of getting better, I would know it.
You say all of this right after China donated tons of medical equipment and medical teams to Iran and Italy.
I saw how things were in China during the early days of the lockdown, how both people and government cooperated. I will believe my own eyes.
Of course, no government is perfect. Mistakes will be made. And some people are corrupt. But none of that means that throwing the baby out with the bathwater -- being overly cynical and declaring all governments as evil -- is the right answer. Now is the time for both people and governments to learn about what cooperation and good governance is about.
There are countries, like most in the EU, or Canada, or NZ, or JP or South Korea who have their own self-interest but still contribute to the greater cause and global concerns. And there are countries like China and in recent years the US which only care for their own interests. Look just at trade and investment terms - the ones I listed first are very open, the latter totally set rules that prefer own players. The same in any geopolitical concern.
I don't know how much of the claim that those countries are more "altruistic" than China is true. For the sake of argument, let's assume it is true.
I ask you this: must a country be "altruistic"? Is it wrong for a country to look after its own interest?
Clearly, if there interest conflicts with yours, then there is a problem -- but that is a problem regardless of whether they are normally altruistic.
But as long as their interests don't conflict with yours, is it wrong to be "selfish" (or a more charitable interpretation: "to mind one's own business")?
And even if a country helps another not for altruistic reasons, but because there is something to gain, then is there anything wrong with that? Isn't that also called a win-win? Donating and being altruistic is a neutral-win, but couldn't one argue that win-win deals are more sustainable?
> Then you should know better than anyone here that even your family is strongly incentivized by an Orwellian surveillance system with a social credit score system to lie even to you.
Yeah... No, that's not how it works. Hasn't for 40 years. I was born there.
> I also do not believe that you are arguing in good faith - it is no secret that Chinese astroturfing is all over the internet.
Check my account history and my github profile. I am a real person.
> This is literally the government that is imprisoning millions of ethnic Muslims and at best forcing propaganda down their throats
TLDR: Terrorism. For 20 years. 10% of the population is radicalized and thinks killing others is good. Hundreds of people killed, thousands wounded. In part fueled by poverty, in part fueled by radical education. Something clearly must be done. But what?
The US chose to bomb muslim countries. China chose to force them to go to school to learn ethics, mandarin, and job skills -- what you call "forcing propaganda down their throat".
Now, forcing people to do anything is less than ideal. And they are probably forcing more people than necessary because they can't identify exactly who is radicalized and who isn't. But living in a safe society, where there are no people out to kill you, is ALSO a human right. You can't just ignore this real problem and only focus on the government action part.
I am not saying it is all good but the situation is much more different and nuanced than 'China imprisons millions because China is evil'.
> Do not by swayed so easily by shallow propaganda in the form of aid donations - this does not mean that China is actually recovered
Then shouldn't you be glad that China is over stretching itself? If China is in a bad shape them donating to other countries will destroy China. Never interrupt an enemy who is making a mistake.
> Why is China saber rattling right now about how the US was the origin of the virus[0]?
China isn't claiming the US is definitely the origin. China says this is a possibility. This is based on DNA research of the virus, as well as timing:
1. the US has more mutations of the virus, while China has fewer. Virologists says that this suggests the strain in China is not the original one, and that the ones in US are older. Or something like that: i am not a virologist so i don't fully understand this. Someone who is more knowledge, please fill in.
2. The start of the virus coincided with some military games event where the US army visited Wuhan.
China is not saying the US engineered the virus. It is saying the virus might naturally have started in the US, where it went undetected and brushed away as an abnormally bad flu season.
Now, this is still very much speculation and conspiracy theory-y, I will give you that. But the US CDC isn't exactly doing a good job with investigating the general situation in the US population.
Seeing how the US media talks about China, and seeing how China has traditionally been very defensive in its communications, I don't think it is weird at all for China to one day have become more assertive.
> Because the CCP, like any authoritarian, communist party, puts itself first
It is the US that is putting itself first in this case though. In addition to that i would claim that pretty much every single government right now is quite authoritarian.
Please do not use this site for nationalistic, political, or partisan flamewar. That's not what it's for, and your comments in this thread have gone significantly over the line.
Sunnybrook hospital in Toronto is developing the covid19 vaccine.
I think Saskatchewan has the testing or level-4 microbiology lab. Maybe it's Manitoba with the L4 lab. My province sends all potential covid19 samples to Sask.
TBH I'm not sure why you're being downvoted. Trump's oval office speech where he announced the closing of flights from Europe was one of the most disgusting displays of "leadership" I've ever seen. Right at the moment we needed international cooperation, he was highlighting how great the US was and how bad Europe was and that's why they were seeing spread, when in reality the US is just a couple weeks behind Europe.
Not only that, but it blindsided European leaders. You'd think one would want to communicate an incoming travel ban to our allies before announcing it on live television...
Angela Merkel and many others. You have to know that we don't have the 1 guy is all principle.
A leader here is a communication channel after internal discussion in their party. If there's a rotten egg ( eg. Like in Hungary) the democratic system will adjust to filter him out after a while.
It's slower, yes. But it's less confusing and I think it's a good thing. No wild bull situations like in the US.
I would say that I very much liked Obama. A lot of charisma, he also notified the EU about some things but he did it with a sense of decenty. Which shows clear intellect and respect.
Have you lived in Germany under Angela Merkel's rule or you're out here naming people who aren't Trump? I've lived in Germany for 2 years, left for Ireland because of poor government, who due to their inability to take care of their own people, have resuscitated a right wing that will stop at nothing. If that's what you call a competent leader then you need recalibration. I'm from an African country which has seen crazy high numbers for visa applications to the US as well as overstays because their economy is doing. I haven't lived under Trump's administration so I can make a call here (even though I've started investing heavily in US companies and reaping amazing results). So call Trump incompetent, but when you have to come up with an example of competence please dig deeper. That said, ask the Nigerians and other West Africans whose relatives are sold into slavery via Libya about what they think of Obama. Just to be circumspect.
Extending the topic to right parties in the same country, slavery in another country and personal investments in the short term seems a bit far-fetched to prove your point ;)
Long term, I'd say the economic impact of the tax reduction is laying an unacceptable burden on US financials as a country. And someone else will have to clean up.
But hey, we live in a democracy. Everyone can say what they think ;). It doesn't mean they are right though
40% of Americans don't want you to apologize on their behalf [0]. From a Canadian, this type of comment is exactly what is driving your country apart and what lead to the election of Trump in the first place.
What is your suggestion for unifying with people who support a leader who has abused his power in broad daylight over and over again? And who has abused that power to avoid punishment for other abuses?
It seems pretty fundamental to me: It's a matter of if are you okay with a blatant authoritarian if he's in your side. I don't know how to bridge that cultural difference in how we wish our leaders to behave.
Go talk to them, listen to them, sympathize with them, you know, be a compassionate human instead insinuating their stupidity by outright calling someone they support stupid.
I joined a big discussion group to see how I could convince people ( > 8000 Dutch members on Facebook).
While I took a lot of effort for 5 months to reason with the outliers of the group.
I had concluded that it was not possible to reason with outliers since they used "Whataboutisme" and the only effective way to convince other people and "shut them up" ( I know it sounds rude) was to actually be rude, handle their current arguments and point out the idiocracy of the arguments they were using ( hence the harsh term used).
My effectiveness rate went from 4-5% to almost 90% in having the "last" argument. It also seemed to greatly reduced the amount of pointless topics started by that person.
There was only once someone effective in working arround it, using "doubtful" sources.
I disagree with your second conjecture. The polarization of United States has been largely due to bankcrupting its middle class of its industry, paying off executives(not literally, but due to allure of making cheaper goods in China), social media and Russian interference in the election of Trump.
This is a grand plan of Russia and China to divide western nations, increase internal anti-US propaganda to bolster their authoritarian regimes.
You're pointing to the symptoms, not root cause. And this is exactly what the communist regimes want the west to do - fight against each other. Just wait before Canada get's roped in all of this as well.
It's already happening in Canada. Look at our last election [0]. A clear divide between Toronto and Western Canada. It was a very sad day for me to see my country completely torn in two with both sides cementing themselves in place.
The Soviet Union ended 30 years ago and reducing China's government to "communist regime" is at best naive and ignorant and at worst deliberately misleading.
You're right, I'll edit to to "authoritarian" regimes. What I meant was that authoritarian goverments cannot afford dissent and try everything to supress.
This is the same guy who first downplayed the virus risks, then now that is completely out of control in the US as well cries wolf against "enemies" from the outside to boost his strong man in power image.
One wouldn't expect this from someone whose grandfather himself was killed by the 1918 pandemic flu.
In fact the US is worse than many parts of Europe, the difference is that the US government is not testing people! In the last week, testing crawled to a near halt, while the virus is ravaging almost every state of the country.
No, Americans have a strong Constitutional right to move freely within the country, with large quantities of consistent court precedent on this matter in diverse situations. Suspension of this right requires both individual due process and compelling government interest (e.g. imprisonment for a serious crime). It is on the same tier of rights as freedom of speech in the US. The Constitutional authority simply isn't there for the Federal government to ban travel, and any attempt to do so would be met with an instant court injunction.
The courts have also consistently rejected overly clever de facto travel bans via regulatory mechanisms intended to prohibit the use of common modes of transportation. Courts have taken a very dim view of arguments, which the government has made in the past, that e.g. free travel can effectively be restricted to walking. American courts have ruled in the past that the right to travel extends to the use of common modes of transportation.
If fundamental Constitutional rights could be suspended every time the government claimed an emergency, Americans would have no rights in practice. There is no allowance for the blanket suspension of fundamental rights by reason of public emergency in the US.
Except that they did not institute a travel ban after 9/11. They temporarily suspended air travel in order address manifest safety and security deficiencies in the US air travel system. The FAA has grounded fleets many times under similar authority. The highways were still open.
That is a very different legal authority than de facto blanket bans on free movement of Americans, which is expressly disallowed by the Constitution. This has actually been adjudicated several times in the Supreme Court, which has consistently rejected attempts by the government to use regulatory technicalities to deprive people of their right of free movement via common modes of transportation even subject to due process.
This is not new territory, there is extensive court precedent surrounding the right of free travel in the US. It is on the same tier of right as freedom of speech in the US.
That is not applicable here. The US Supreme Court has repeatedly asserted that freedom to travel in the US is a fundamental right like free speech; regulation of interstate commerce is prohibited from violating those rights. Suspension of that right requires a narrowly targeted and compelling government interest, blanket prohibitions are prohibited, and requires due process for affected individuals.
In other words, "you might have COVID-19" has the same authority granting power as "you might be a terrorist" or "you might be a child pornographer", which is to say, very little absent specific evidence.
I have zero faith in the current federal and supreme courts upholding those rights. Stare decisis is basically dead and a full third of the judiciary are federalists or federalist-adjacent.
Also, I think you drastically underestimate what can be legally done under the aegis of "you might be (insert undesirable class here)".
At the same time, Germany, Norway, Denmark, and others(?) closed their borders contrary to demands from the EU itself. International cooperation can and does happen without travel.
Honestly, it should have happened a week+ ago. There were accounts of people who changed their flights from Italy to hop through London so they could skip quarantine procedures. That's irresponsible at best and dangerous and accelerated the spread at worst.
It's a lower proportion than the general population so I don't know why it would be particularly surprising. You have to realize nearly half the country has a favorable opinion of him as President.
It's a good reminder to be skeptical of our own beliefs and ways of thinking. Foolish thoughts, tribal biases, and motivated reasoning -- to name just a few distortions of reality -- are things that every human experiences.
I like to think is possible to get better at it. For me, things like meditation help, as the ego is often a main hindrance.
There are a lot of reflexively partisan Trump supporters, more precisely. It's routine to find fairly reasonable partisan discussions, with facts on both sides, reasonably broad participation, etc... Yet see that one "side" is grayed out.
This is a serious problem, and while I'm sure someone will disagree, it seems almost completely asymmetric to me. There's an army of centipedes, as it were, poisoning the discourse here with vote buttons and not arguments.
I don't see how it is possible for both sides to be grayed out if, as you say, one side isn't presenting arguments. With no arguments you can't get grayed out.
You can't even be sure it is Trump supporters doing the voting and flagging. Maybe some of the anti-Trump people don't want flamebait. The rules here are that you aren't supposed to use the site for political battle.
One side is unafraid to openly express political hostility. The other side is silent. That should tell you who is afraid to express an opinion. Imagine if Trump supporters did come here and make equally partisan comments, gloating about how Trump is the most capable person for handling the crisis and how he has done a fantastic job. Those comments would be well beyond gray in less than an hour. They would be [flagged][dead] and the users might even be banned. (don't test it now, days later in an aging thread)
As a German living in the US I think I can see it from both sides. I totally agree that the current US administration does a ton of stupid things but before complaining too much the Europeans should beef up their defense so they can stand on their own feet.
> Welt am Sonntag also quoted an unidentified German government source as saying Trump was trying to secure the scientists’ work exclusively, and would do anything to get a vaccine for the United States, “but only for the United States.”
"unidentified German government source" plus:
- Timeline of CEO replacement just days after meeting Trump
- Everything we know about Trump administration and their "america first" philosophy.
- Everything we know about Trump himself and his xenophobia.
so yeah... I would put this in the "very probably true bin"
Not exactly. Here’s the only attributed quote from the German government:
> “The German government is very interested in ensuring that vaccines and active substances against the new coronavirus are also developed in Germany and Europe,” a Health Ministry spokeswoman said, confirming a quote in the newspaper.
> “In this regard, the government is in intensive exchange with the company CureVac,” she added.
But it's also cartoon-evil, so crazily nasty that you wonder whether it can actually be true. I mean really? He wants credit for saving America from the virus? But also to make sure nobody else gets it, even though it wouldn't stop America from getting it?
It's not like you can keep a plan like that secret, either.
Trump seems very committed to the image that the USA is doing a better job than the rest of dealing with the coronavirus. He was pretty transparent about his real motives last week when his stated concern with the cruise ship was "doubling our numbers" with something that was not our fault.
> "America First" is the administrations primary guiding principle.
No, kleptocracy is the administatin’s primary guiding principle. “America First” is one of the main propaganda tactics they use to sell their kleptocracy to the masses, not a guiding principle.
I mean, potato/tomato. America First is very much framing every and all issue as zero-sum and the Trump admin as the state (in true fascist tradition). In that way, kleptocracy is "america first".
We have production capacity to make flu vaccines for everyone, I don't think capacity is an issue, the issue is more a proven safe vaccine doesn't exist yet.
Lets just say it that way: There is a lot of anti-american undercurrent in the german population. The obvious hate for germany and the economic war agains europe and especially germany from the Trump administration did not help that.
Currently, China wants to supply Europe with masks, desinfectant etc... while our "ally" tries to steal a vaccine. This might do a massive, massive amount of damage.
With regards to :
"...
German government sources told Reuters on Sunday that the U.S. administration was looking into how it could gain access to a potential vaccine being developed by a German firm, CureVac.
..."
Is there a way, to independently check validity of Reuter's claims?
In the view as extraordinary claims, require 'extraordinary evidence'
My take on reuters, bbc, wash post, new york times ,vox, la times, ars technica
is, that they consider Trump and his administration as their 'sworn enemy'.
Once a bad actor has made it clear they are a bad actor (which Trump has - he's committed plenty of crimes in broad daylight), they lose the benefit of the doubt.
Bad actors can thrive on unbounded benefit of the doubt. At some point, they have to go bankrupt. Trump is well beyond that point.
Dear God, HN, exercise some reading comprehension.
The part that's making so many commenters here shut their brains off:
> Welt am Sonntag also quoted an unidentified German government source as saying Trump was trying to secure the scientists’ work exclusively, and would do anything to get a vaccine for the United States, “but only for the United States.”
The quote above is manipulating you into believing that the USA is attepmting to prevent Germans from getting that vaccine. THAT'S the part that is completely not real.
EDIT: Some of the questions you want to ask when you see an article quote like this:
- Who is this unnamed source, exactly?
- Is the article accurately representing what they said?
- In particular: does it accurately represent their intended meaning, in context?
- Does that person speak for the German government? Or is this one government employee's opinion?
- If a German company moves its research labs into the USA, but remains a German company - like the article says - wouldn't that make it impossible for them to hide the secret formula for a vaccine?
- Why would the USA (or any country) even try to keep a vaccine formula secret, in the face of a global pandemic like this? If you think about it, is that comic-book-villain scenario even plausible?
As a Dutch citizen I would prefer Americans to have control over this technology than any other country. Merkel has never really cared for German/European citizens but rather for the rest of world. Perhaps it's a trauma of WW2, and she wants to do good.
However in these times it's important that own citizens are prio 1. Trump cares for Americans and America has hardly ever let it's Western European allies down.
From my perspective it's in good hands in the U.S. and I trust anything that comes out of it will also benefit the rest of the world eventually.
You seriously want to have a county that is touting America First for the last 4 years in control over medicine that might cure or at least protect your fellow citizens instead of your neighbor and biggest trading partner that is also part of the same governing organization?
You have to be a troll or have a very strange agenda, seriously.
Have you followed the situation in Europe lately? It's a mess. Also during these times, no coordination of the EU at all. When it comes to it, every country is on its own. But worst is that European leaders are afraid to quickly take (tough) measures, something American leaders have shown to do much easier.
i.e. the bored intern with nothing better to do than make stuff up. Sprinkle in some quotes from actual high ranking officials on adjacent topics, and you can almost make it feel like it's the same conversation. Hurray journalism.
I suppose the apology you would expect according to your tone in case of misinformation and wrong speculation is not one you would give yourself. Hurray ...
I'm not asking for apologies. I have no idea what the link you sent me says, nor what Handelsblatt is. If you're trying to prove something you're going to need to serve up something better than that.
Don’t think it’s Chinese propaganda but this is the only “official” statement in the article:
> “The German government is very interested in ensuring that vaccines and active substances against the new coronavirus are also developed in Germany and Europe,” a Health Ministry spokeswoman said, confirming a quote in the newspaper.
> “In this regard, the government is in intensive exchange with the company CureVac,” she added.
All the extreme statements are attributed to unnamed sources. Sadly you need to read news articles carefully these days.
Best case scenario, vacine will be available to everyone in the north by the end of summer, worst case scenario, there's not gonna be anything and in October we will have another pandemia with mutations that eventually will be more deadly.
As it happened with other 2nd rounds of a pandemia in history.
Now If we get to discover something and the deployment can be only done to X% of the population who do we save? Our own country or the neighbors?...
Italy was asking to Europe for medical supply and nobody responded, every single country is gonna play egoistic in this topic and don't expect anyone to give thousands of millions in missed workforce to save the older in neighbor countries. Cold reality.
I assume that mass production of a vacine works by multiplying an initial sample, so the exponential growth can't be started in every country at the same time, there is a time constraint and is global
If anything, the agreement should be conditional on vaccine being distributed to all funding countries, in order of some index of global health priority.
I'm not loving this, especially since things haven't even gotten as bad as they're likely to get.