Why the Vaccine Rollout is such a chaotic SNAFU - one word.

My wife spent a ton of time and effort trying to get us both vaccinated before mid March so we could go on vacation. It was so maddening and screwed up and frustrating that she almost lost it several times.

Digresion: She was, in her time, a team leader leading teams who did audits of the largest US and US headquartered multinational corporations.

Today, after reading the linked article I stuck my head in the room where she was quilting and said "The CDC software for handling all things vaccine and vaccination related was custom built by Deloitte." Hilarity ensued, and, at last, "we should have known".

Don't wanna go anywhere near disclosureville, but that reaction is the long and short of it, all one really needs to know.

The article tries to explain much more and perhaps make some excuses, but no further discussion is really needed or necessary.

https://www.technologyreview.com/2021/01/30/1017086/cdc-44-million-vacci...

be well and have a good one

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ggersh's picture

that's a feature not a bug, so here we are

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I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish

"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"

Heard from Margaret Kimberley

enhydra lutris's picture

@ggersh

be well and have a good one

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That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

If the current situation doesn’t make a persuasive case for a Universal National Health Care Program, I don’t know what will.

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Capitalism is the extraordinary belief that the nastiest of men for the nastiest of motives will somehow work for the benefit of all."
- John Maynard Keynes

@ovals49
because none of the familiar (western) countries with a national health care system has fared well either. The UK's NHS that has been hollowed out for decades is barely a public health care system and the UK's deaths/M pop are higher than the US.

Compare OECD reported spending with COVID-19 results. The US is getting the least bang for the buck, but that's not what US consumers want from their health care dollars.

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snoopydawg's picture

@Marie

The UK health care system. He now has Covid and is in hospital. I’m not sure if it’s the general fund or something else, but I don’t think it’s a happy story. The government should be providing funds. It’s like the articles on elderly women who are still working as a greeter at Walmart. No that is not great. Unless she wants to work at her age. It’s a black mark against social security being too low for too many people.

Health care workers are quitting in droves because Cuomo is micromanaging everything himself and screwing it up. Lots of the same problems all over the country.

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Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.

Pluto's Republic's picture

@snoopydawg

(Although taxpayers already gave them grants to develop it.)

The UK only pays $15. Israel only pays $9.

My numbers may be a bit off, but the general ratios are right.

We should hire Israel to negotiate on our behalf with the drug giants..

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____________________

The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato
snoopydawg's picture

@Pluto's Republic

and that Russia is willing to give other countries the recipe so they can make their own. This is how it should work for everything. Instead as you note they get money from the government to make it and then they sell it back to us. It’s not done that way in a lot of countries, but we have to make sure that everything we do costs the peasants as much as they want to charge. Fck them.

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@snoopydawg
coronavirus results (and its numbers are being managed if not manipulated), they aren't good. So, either not enough vaccines have been administered or they aren't effective enough.

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snoopydawg's picture

@Marie

So, either not enough vaccines have been administered or they aren't effective enough.

n a major breakthrough for Russia’s Sputnik V Covid-19 vaccine, the prestigious British medical journal The Lancet has published preliminary Phase III trial results showing it is highly effective – notably, for all age groups.

Data from 19,866 volunteers – 4,902 of whom were in the placebo group – showed that Sputnik V had an overall efficacy of 91.6 percent, rising to 91.8 percent among the group of 2,144 volunteers over the age of 60, according to the interim results of the Phase III clinical trial published in the Lancet on Tuesday.

At the end of the study, there were 62 confirmed Covid-19 cases in the placebo group and only 16 in the vaccine group. Sputnik V proved to be 100 percent effective in preventing the development of severe cases.

While the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines require very low temperatures – between -70C and -20C – Sputnik V can be stored at 2-8 degrees Celsius without spoiling. The Russian-made vaccine also relies on two different adenovirus vectors – genetically modified flu viruses that cannot reproduce in the human body – which generate a more effective defense compared to other vaccines using the same vector for both shots.

https://www.rt.com/russia/514334-lancet-sputnikv-clinical-trial-data/

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@snoopydawg
over the Astra Zeneca / Oxford vaccine, with claims from EU member states that the there is not adequate data on safety and efficacy for 65+ seniors. The Daily Mail article if full of the politics of Brexit and contractual disputes.

Boris Johnson and UK health chiefs have insisted that the jab, made by Swedish-British pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca, is effective for all age groups.

But pouring petrol on the row again today, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen accused Britain of compromising on safety by giving swift approval to the jab.

And now a baseless claim from

France's president Emmanuel Macron (pictured Thursday) has astonishingly claimed the AstraZeneca vaccine is 'almost ineffective' on people who are over 65 years of age

Jockeying for power and money is once again taking the lead as the pandemic continues, largely unrestrained.

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Capitalism is the extraordinary belief that the nastiest of men for the nastiest of motives will somehow work for the benefit of all."
- John Maynard Keynes

snoopydawg's picture

@ovals49

I wonder why I haven’t besides I don’t watch mainstream media, but Twitter and the sites I read haven’t said anything either. How old is the news?

I watched a video on how safe the vaccines are for the elderly. It provided links, but numbers hurt my brain.

Got any links? Thanks.

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@snoopydawg
vaccine options. My daughter had forwarded a link from BBC news about France NOT allowing 65+ to receive the AZ/Oxford vaccine currently being rolled out. The headline was alarming, but as usual the substance of the matter was not at all clear cut. Also, the BBC is right up there with the NYT when it comes to shading facts to support the approved narrative being pushed by the PTB. I smelled a rat. Link to Daily Mail piece.

Turns out there is no evidence whatsoever that the AZ vaccine is not safe for us oldsters, but simply a paucity of data from the trials to affirm efficacy for those over 65. You know what they say about absence of evidence and evidence of absence. The EU regulators, however, used the small numbers or older participants in the trials as a pretext for pressing the Brits on a number of political/financial and contractual issues. Quelle surprise!

The much lower pricing on the AZ vaccine has to be a threat to the first to market mRNA vaccines. The raft of disparaging and misleading information about AZ being promoted by mainstream sources seems to me to have much more to do with that fact than any genuine concern for the health and well being of those anxiously awaiting their “jab”.

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Capitalism is the extraordinary belief that the nastiest of men for the nastiest of motives will somehow work for the benefit of all."
- John Maynard Keynes

Creosote.'s picture

@snoopydawg
in the Guardian by commenters below the Bell and Rowson cartoons by people who sound familiar with the details. The situation is being mishandled and is confused and confusing. Britain's vaccine administration has been late, scrambled, immensely disorganized. Before Brexit the country had fine virus prouction labs. Now Brexit will be worse for the country than the virus.

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enhydra lutris's picture

@Pluto's Republic

people smuggle in medications from Canada and Mexico, among other places.

be well and have a good one

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That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

Granma's picture

@enhydra lutris It is ok to order up to 3 months supply of medication from Canadian pharmacies for personal use. It can be quite a savings even from the co-pay with prescription insurance.

Anyone who wants to look into Canadian pharmacies and/or prices can go to PharmacyChecker.com.

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@snoopydawg
Cuomo strikes me as someone that isn't smart enough to know his own ignorance and get the education he needs. (Did he attend one of the Gates, etal. conferences on pandemic planning? That must have been put together by a bunch of know-nothings because they were AWOL when Covid-19 hit. When in fact a pandemic plan shouldn't have been high-tech unless the plan was nothing more than fund fast development of a new vaccine.)

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@Marie

I've also read that he is quite difficult to work with.

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"Without the right to offend, freedom of speech does not exist." Taslima Nasrin

@Marie I lived there a long time and I have my own stories but I'll stick with one about my daughter and grandsons.
A good example is when one of my grandsons told my daughter he felt kinda dizzy and had "a funny feeling right here" as he pointed to his heart.

My daughter got him in the car immediately and took him straight to a doctor where all kinds of tests were done, MRI, Blood test etc..
Long story short I don't remember what my daughter told me about what the doctor said, but bottom line everything was okay. Total cost? Zero.

I've enjoyed watching her on Facebook arguing about healthcare with her right-wing cousins in New Orleans and them railing about how letting the government run health care is a disaster in waiting.
She politely tells them the Canadian govt. does not run healthcare,they just pay the bills,there are no co-pays, or 'premiums' to pay, and when you go to a doctor the first question is "what's wrong" not let me see if that is covered under your health care insurance.

What the govt. does do ,other than just pay the bills, is they have 'price guidelines' doctors have to follow, and they are paid well based on the 'fair market prices' for their services. So no one can gouge the system with inflated prices.

In my own experiences the long waiting lists are bullsh*t, and about taxes she tells her cousins they're minimal.In fact I don't even remember what part of my paycheck taxes went on healthcare,in short it didn't stand out.

Also that she tells her cousins she wants everyone to have health care, doesn't want a sick society around her or her family,and also no one goes bankrupt from medical bills.

Of course her cousins carry on about 'personal responsibility' not a govt. handout and other red herring arguments, but she ended it with an "okay ya' got me, I confess I'll show you a picture of the bill from that doctor visit'.
I can picture them licking their lips waiting, and then they get shown a blank piece of paper.Lol.

One last note, if my daughter was in the US and my grandson came to her with the same complaint she would have to struggle with the decision on whether or not she should take him in immediately, or because of costs maybe she should wait to see if it goes away really soon, hoping it's like heartburn or something.

Anxiety while waiting and hoping it was not something that needed urgent care.

A lot of people make the wrong call on decisions like that every hour in the US.

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enhydra lutris's picture

@ovals49 @ovals49

one will something replace it without an enormous socio-political upheaval.

be well and have a good one

edited for spelling

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That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

Pluto's Republic's picture

And failure. No where more so than government. And certainly related to every big-money aspect of the Pandemic, especially the development of vaccines. More on that another time.

What follows is a wide-swinging digression but an interesting (albeit typical) example of corruption I read about today, the Crédit Mobilier scandal. [Corporation screws the Federal government for funding. Members of congress sell their votes to the corporation in exchange for easing regulations on their operation.

Have you ever heard of it?

The Crédit Mobilier scandal, which came to public attention in 1872, was a two-part fraud conducted from 1864 to 1867 by the Union Pacific Railroad and the Crédit Mobilier of America construction company in the building of the eastern portion of the First Transcontinental Railroad. The story was broken by The New York Sun during the 1872 campaign of Ulysses S. Grant.

First, a fraudulent company, Crédit Mobilier of America, was created by Union Pacific executives to greatly inflate construction costs. Though the railroad cost only $50 million to build, Crédit Mobilier billed $94 million and Union Pacific executives pocketed the excess $44 million. Then, part of the excess cash and $9 million in discounted stock was used to bribe several Washington politicians for laws, funding, and regulatory rulings favorable to the Union Pacific.[2]

The scandal negatively affected the careers of many politicians and nearly bankrupted Union Pacific. The scandal caused widespread public distrust of Congress and the federal government during the Gilded Age.

.

Upshot, one of the Congressmen implicated happened to be the guy who wrote the garbled 14th Amendment to the Constitution. The scandal derailed his career, pun intended. Garbled wording in the 14th Amendment is what the Democrats are pinning their impeachment hopes on. Democrats are convinced they are too weak and corrupt to win the 2024 election if Trump should run again.

Looking at this case, it occurred to me that everything they did is pretty much the way business is conducted in Washington, today. No one seems to have a problem with it.

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____________________

The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato
snoopydawg's picture

@Pluto's Republic

and 2020 certainly proves that doesn’t it? Of course congress is just as corrupt today as it was back then whit all the bribery happening between congress and lobbyists who now write the bills for congress to pass. No more back and forth between staff. It’s done right the first time.

Congress knows that defense companies are jacking up their prices for equipment and such. The joke about a hammer costing xxx amount of dollars is based on truth. A nut can cost government $250 if it’s special made. Corruption in government is a mobious strip.

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@snoopydawg
federal departments issue the contacts not Congress. There are formal procedures and rules that contracting officers are supposed to follow and they include checks and balances. If a contracting officer pays $20 for a ten cent item, they should be fired for incompetence and investigated for kickbacks/bribes.

Special purpose vehicles or innovative design vehicles (mostly DOD purchases) are less amenable to those checks and balances because there is little to no competition among those able to make it and it's not so easy to pre-define all the construction elements that will conform to the government spec requirements. Still cost overrun payment applications are analyzed for reasonableness before being paid. A simple solution is no more toys for the DOD. Close all the foreign bases and bring the troops home.

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Alligator Ed's picture

@Marie How do we manage our empire without our troops in 110 countries? Really. Where are we going to store our ships and planes so they are ready for instant retaliation against any who dare upset American Hegemony? Two of our biggest aircraft carriers are called Taiwan and South Korea. Will we have to scrap them for the sake of some ideologic concept of peace and fairness?

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@Alligator Ed
and a percentage of the remainder isn't in good working order. No new purchases and the surplus will rapidly diminish. Keep the good stuff at home (recycle), and offer some of the junk to the multinationals that can run and pay for their own empire.

Redeploy the manufacturing workforce to high-speed rail and renewable energy. No need to frame it as a "peace" effort, but an economic effort. Excess military spending is inflationary because it consumes wealth with no value to an economy or the people.

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enhydra lutris's picture

@Pluto's Republic

because people went down for it. Today there are ways to pull that off legally and it is being done all the time, especially on defense contracts, which almost beg to have it done.

be well and have a good one.

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That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

@Pluto's Republic
I told everyone that congressmen are just like Chicago aldermen except they demand fatter envelopes.

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I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.

gulfgal98's picture

I am in Tallahassee, Florida which is the state capital. When the vaccine first became available here in Jan., there was a run on people trying to register to get it from the local health department. Only one of our friends and his wife were able to get the vaccine before they shut down applications. Then they told people to contact their physicians, except most physicians had a very limited supply of the vaccine. For example, my own physician said that the practice with which she is associated had such a limited supply that they were only vaccinating people over the age of 80!

Meanwhile, we and our friends were scrambling to try to find available vaccine in nearby counties. Twice we tried to register to be met with a response that they were closing down acceptance of registrations. Then we even tried to register in Georgia where one friend and our back yard neighbors were able to get the vaccine. However that registration shut down the day after we applied and we were once again out of the loop. I called it vaccine roulette.

Just this past week, we became the fortunate recipients of luck when a friend who worked for a private hospital said that they were opening up to vaccinating members of the public. We jumped on it and were vaccinated with the first dose last Wed. Things are so uncertain as to whether or not they will get a second dose that they told us that they will have to call us when the vaccine comes in.

I feel like we are in the midst of the Hunger Games here in the US.

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Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?

“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy

enhydra lutris's picture

@gulfgal98

that I have a pretty good idea what you mean all the same.

be well and have a good one

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That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

lotlizard's picture

@enhydra lutris  
of a city equipped with every luxury and an all-powerful military, while the 99% labor and endure a marginal, hardscrabble existence in the provinces (called “Districts” numbered 1 through 12) to keep the Capitol-directed economy supplied with food, manufactures, and raw materials.

What an unlikely premise, eh? Where do these writers get their far-fetched dystopian ideas?

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enhydra lutris's picture

@lotlizard

I mean that idea that that could be fiction, of course.

be well and have a good one

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That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

Alligator Ed's picture

@gulfgal98 Project 2035 is the Elitist plan to drastically cull the herd of useless eaters, like Pomeranians and alligators, and especially humans. So screwing up the vaccines with their allegedly life-preserving power is simply a quiet way to let nature take its course until the unlucky croak. Less useless eaters.

Quid est demonstrandum.

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@Alligator Ed @Alligator Ed
That's why i refuse the vaccine until it's been tested three years or preferably five by you guinea pigs.

But but but. all those high politicians getting publicly vaccinated!
Well, how do you know there was anything besides saline solution in the hypo? You don't think that our elected officials and news crews would LIE to us, do you? What are you, a Communist? /snark

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I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.

Alligator Ed's picture

@The Voice In the Wilderness I'm green, not red. Look closely and you perceive that I lack the required pigmentation to a dirty red commie bastard.

Listen, there Voice, Believe the government. Hell, yes! What ever they say, just do a 180˚ on it. So take that into your calculations.

Let me offer a recent example. JoJo claims that he will bring about not only national Unity (a task at which the DNC is proceeding), but International Cooperation For Peace. ICP (I am really getting to love acronyms, aren't you? /s) This means more and better bombs for deposit on other countries--no collateral needed. The deposition of such messages of our capitalist/fascist salvation will be initiated by bombs with precisely timed proximity fuses. Ain't the MIC wunnerful? Pretty soon I am gonna start gushing over JoJo just like Tara Reade (oops, didn't mean to bring that up again)

If I'm red, then I'm dead.

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RantingRooster's picture

was all I needed to know. I understand perfectly why hilarity ensued.

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C99, my refuge from an insane world. #ForceTheVote

enhydra lutris's picture

@RantingRooster

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That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

Alligator Ed's picture

The explanation for how Deloitte could be the only approved source for a product like VAMS, despite having no direct experience in the field, comes down to onerous federal contracting requirements, Schank says. They often require a company to have a long history of federal contracts, which blocks smaller or newer companies that might be a better fit for the task.

No bid. No expertise. No challenge to show how performance compares with other vendors because there are no other venders. Corporate nepotism at its worst.

More graft and corruption hidden behind the "sterile" veneer of "service".

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@Alligator Ed
"No bid" contracts was how the Bush/Cheney admin saved KBR/Halliburton. Contracting officer Bunnatine Greenhouse was fired for reporting the no-bid contract violations.

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