It’s been about three weeks since New York City began - at least, nominally - enforcing its new Key to NYC program. That’s our new mandate requiring proof of vaccination for indoor dining. I’ve eaten out several times since it started, and I think that’s given me some new insight...
Quietly, with very little fanfare, Louisiana got vaccine passports right. https://lawallet.com/covid19/ What's not to like? First off, let's take a peek at their guiding principles: These principles look a lot like what Jeffrey Zients was hinting at when asked at a White House press briefing about vaccine passports: > Our...
I've been a civil servant working in state government for almost ten years. I've worked at several regulatory agencies, I take lots of civil service tests to (among other things) manage my nagging impostor syndrome, and as a result I've also had the opportunity to interview for jobs in this...
Minor quibble on your use of the term "regulation." Since this was being discussed in Congress, this would actually be about proposed statute, not regulations. Statutes are laws enacted by legislative bodies. Regulations are promulgated by executive agencies, to provide the details of how statutes should be implemented (they tend to be saner than statutes, because they're limited by real world constraints; they're also easier to tweak). Lastly, case law is issued by court cases that are considered to be "binding authority." All of these are considered to be "sources of law."
I think of laws in practical terms as machines for managing human conflict. My redux of the various branches of government is as follows:
Hot take - we've been in denial for several decades now about a deep, nagging epistemological crisis. If the "AI disaster" was your pipes breaking, and you filed a claim with your insurance company about it, they'd deny it as being the result of wear and tear.
Human knowledge long ago passed the point where it was possible for a single person to understand significant pieces of it, operationally. The level of trust that's required to function is terrifying. Ai does all that - faster.
I suspect that some sort of regular recommended boosting schedule will evolve, but it won't be something noticeable to a layperson. You'll go to annual checkups, as you should, and doctor will tell you to get a bunch o' shots and/or blood tests.
Adding - does anyone else wish there was a seamless, streamlined way of recruiting more people into clinical trials so we could bring new treatments to market faster, and while we're at it at least give half the people in the trial an effective treatment?
Like, how about sn annual general consent form, directly sent to clinicaltrials.gov in exchange for a modest tax break?
What's sorely needed is an international drug approval reciprocity treaty. A single organization, say, part of the WHO, would be tasked with periodically vetting national level food and drug approval agencies of signator countries. In exchange for this service, drugs would be instantly approved when just one country approves it.
ETA: It looks like bilateral "agreements" are a thing:
But of course that falls well short of an international treaty. And lots of bilateral agreements strikes me as o(n^2) more complicated than a hub-and-spoke framework.
And I should also add that my general vision for federalism kind of goes in both directions. Namely, I'd like it if each state could be allowed to form its own mini-FDA but the federal government's role would be to "approve the approvers"
Weirdly, with the collapse of any externally imposed controls (lockdowns, mask mandates, vaccination requirements) and just general fatigue in the population at large, it's become easier than ever to buy one's way out of getting covid than it's ever been. For instance, N95 masks are way cheaper - enough that I can switch them daily. With so few people getting the bivalent shot, I'm seriously considering going back for seconds.
Just dropping in to plant the idea of "parametric insurance indexed to wastewater surveillance."
Munich Re, Lloyd's, are you listening?
Re medical bills (or any bills, for that matter):
A major change from the TCJA in 2017 was allowing more businesses, including some health care providers and third party debt collectors, to use cash accounting rather than accrual accounting for the purpose of computing taxable income. The upshot is that treatment plus a printed and mailed bill no longer counts as revenue for a lot more businesses. That's precisely what allows for the "aspirational" bills you're describing. Repealing this provision would go a long way to taming this particular aspect, I believe.
The news about Evusheld is indeed disappointing. Why mAb's aren't updated in lockstep with vaccines is baffling: they could be harvesting mAb's at the same time that they're testing vaccines using the same mice
It’s been about three weeks since New York City began - at least, nominally - enforcing its new Key to NYC program. That’s our new mandate requiring proof of vaccination for indoor dining. I’ve eaten out several times since it started, and I think that’s given me some new insight into how this ordinance is going to work. I’m not nearly as skeptical of it as I was, and I hope that what I’m about to share helps convince some of the businesses that are hostile to the idea that it’s worth their effort to comply cheerfully.
I work for state government, and I’ve been doing a lot of field work lately in... (read 1594 more words →)
Quietly, with very little fanfare, Louisiana got vaccine passports right.
https://lawallet.com/covid19/
What's not to like?
First off, let's take a peek at their guiding principles:
These principles look a lot like what Jeffrey Zients was hinting at when asked at a White House press briefing about vaccine passports:
Our role is to help ensure that any solutions in this area should be simple, free, open source, accessible to people both digitally and on paper, and designed from the start to protect people’s privacy.
I love that they're building on existing infrastructure - digital drivers licenses. When one person scans another person's DDL, they instantly pull up the person's photo from the state's DMV. That all but eliminates the... (read 237 more words →)
I've been a civil servant working in state government for almost ten years. I've worked at several regulatory agencies, I take lots of civil service tests to (among other things) manage my nagging impostor syndrome, and as a result I've also had the opportunity to interview for jobs in this leviathan I expect to be connected to for the foreseeable future. Even when I didn't get the jobs I interviewed for, it's always given me an opportunity to "pull back the curtain" on a lot of the under-appreciated things that government does (sometimes unbeknownst to average citizens).
Currently, I work as a paralegal, but I dabble with actuarial science (I passed Exam P... (read 175 more words →)
If I could quadruple plus this comment I would