[HN Gopher] Decades after polio, Martha is among the last to sti... ___________________________________________________________________ Decades after polio, Martha is among the last to still rely on an iron lung Author : pseudolus Score : 177 points Date : 2021-10-26 11:26 UTC (1 days ago) (HTM) web link (www.npr.org) (TXT) w3m dump (www.npr.org) | fumblebee wrote: | That cookies landing page is a crime against humanity. When will | this problem be solved! | Zababa wrote: | When websites stop trying to gather data at every opportunity. | a1369209993 wrote: | When we start punishing 'white-collar' crimes against humanity | such as lobbying, censorship, and - as in this case - | espionage. | watt wrote: | When landing pages stop trying to send cookies to visitors who | are there only to look at that one page. | jasonpeacock wrote: | New collars are already on their way: | | https://twitter.com/RealSexyCyborg/status/145289814620013363... | corndoge wrote: | The amount of insinuations, accusations and anti- | American/tech/white/male/journalism sentiments packed into such | a small thread is incredible. | | It's a news story about a health patient, yet Naomi seems to | expect NPR to act as Martha's personal insurer and care | advocate. Would it have been better if NPR didn't publish it at | all? Then Naomi would never have been given the chance to | virtue signal for exposure. Lose-lose. | dralley wrote: | Naomi Wu has had poor experiences with western news outlets - | Vice news outed her against her will in a piece they wrote on | her, and she lives in a country that doesn't have an | especially liberal attitude towards homosexuality. So there | is understandably some salt on that basis, but also... | | In this case plenty of other news outlets _have_ covered her | in their articles about Martha: | https://www.wired.co.uk/article/iron-lung-maker-community | | As far as "tech/white/male", you really only have to read the | comments people post in any thread about her on Reddit to | figure that one out. I can't even imagine what her inbox must | look like. | nend wrote: | That article is from a previous donation years ago. Naomi | herself says her recent donation wasn't used[1]. | | Is NPR obligated to mention all failed attempts to acquire | new collars? It seems unlikely they excluded this | information because of Naomi's gender or race. | | It's great that Naomi donated successfully before and has | tried to again, but as you noted she's received plenty of | positive media from her donations already. | | [1] - "I just could not get anyone to visit her and do | final fitting and troubleshooting on the collars I had | manufactured for her." - https://twitter.com/RealSexyCyborg | /status/145289590785527398... | junon wrote: | Especially since for anyone reading the article it's clear | why she's (rightfully) annoyed. | | > She has only a handful of collars left. "I really am | desperate," she says. "That's the most scary thing in my | life right now -- is not finding anybody that can make | those collars." | | Naomi does a lot of interesting work and is snubbed quite a | lot. She made it quite public that this was happening and | yet NPR _still_ snubbed her. | Chris2048 wrote: | Did Martha herself not reach out to Naomi? It would seem | to make more sense to me than NPR doing so.. | morelisp wrote: | I mean there's also plenty of other options, like the | parts didn't fundamentally work and it's easier to just | forget about it and write a new article than risk another | media blowup by bringing a Twitter personality into a | story that's not really about her? | junon wrote: | That makes absolutely zero sense, though. She's also not | a twitter personality. She's a full-blown engineer with a | very popular Youtube channel and following and has done | these sorts of things quite often. | morelisp wrote: | Whatever else she _also_ is, she 's absolutely a social | media personality. | | > full-blown engineer | | This, I seriously doubt. As far as I know she's very deep | in the DIY/maker scene, but I don't think she's been | flashing around a PE cert. Or maybe we have a difference | of opinion what a "full-blown engineer" is. | brokensegue wrote: | i'm an engineer and i'm not even sure what "PE cert" | stands for. certification means very litte. | lapetitejort wrote: | A Professional Engineer certification can mean "We trust | you to work on things where human lives may be at stake". | Gatekeeping engineers use this to exclude everyone else. | If your screw-up doesn't cost human lives then you're not | a _real_ engineer. | junon wrote: | > If your screw-up doesn't cost human lives then you're | not a real engineer. | | This is such a ridiculous, asinine, and outright _wrong_ | assertion that it warrants no reasoned response. | sho_hn wrote: | I'm fairly sure the post you're replying you was | interpretative-facetious. | vangelis wrote: | There's a lot of engineers out there who wouldn't count | as engineers by that metric. | sho_hn wrote: | Naomi Wu is not a US citizen (the English name is a | pseudonym). The NSPE is a US-only entity. | masklinn wrote: | That makes absolutely no sense, Wu is in china so _some_ | back and forth in order to get the collars to fit | correctly is to be expected. Following which you 're done | because the chinese shop can make the collars to order | whenever that's needed. | | > bringing a Twitter personality into a story that's not | really about her? | | Wu was _already involved in this_. Per her comments she | 'd already sent packages of collars to be tested and | altered / fitted. | | Hell, mentioning that there was a volunteer / grassroots | effort to produce new collars would have been more honest | than the article going "collars where?" | morelisp wrote: | It's a light human interest story, not a comprehensive | international assessment of iron lungs parts suppliers or | formal inventory and provenance check of Martha's stock. | mrighele wrote: | She has the right to be annoyed with those that were | supposed to deliver and test the collars, not with Martha | Lillard or NPR. | | From the point of view of M.L., she is maybe one of | several that promised to help but could do it (not a | fault of Naomi Wu of course, but of those that first | contacted her for help and then left things unfinished), | so it doesn't surprise me that she was not mentioned. | junon wrote: | NPR asserted in their article that help was few and far | in between when this wasn't the case. Naomi has certainly | gone above and beyond in attempting to help. It should be | noted that the difficulty is not in finding help, but in | the logistics. It reads very much like a plea to emotion, | how NPR worded it. | sho_hn wrote: | Beyond the outlets, I think it's useful to be familiar with | this episode: https://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?p=5046 | | Dale Dougherty later posted an open letter in apology. | fxtentacle wrote: | Her handle is called "RealSexyCyborg" and she's reviewing | gaming tech in a bikini. I'm pretty sure it was a | deliberate trade-off on her side to present herself like | this. | | EDIT: This is my reply to the reply to "The amount of [..] | anti-[..]white/male [..] is incredible." | vorpalhex wrote: | Because real hackers are unwashed, unshaved and live in | hoodies? | | As a community we are not really a suit and tie sort of | affair. Whether that means a bikini, a nice cotton henley | or your favorite cyberpunk cosplay - who cares? | fxtentacle wrote: | The comment that I replied to said that she has a valid | point being anti-male because she receives so much | unwanted attention. And my reply is that I believe the | sexualized attention isn't unwanted but instead it's part | of her marketing strategy which includes - among other | things - the "sexy cyborg" branding and 18+ videos. | | In a similar vein, if I wanted to make a YouTube channel | that appeals to true hackers, I might stop shaving and | showering for a few days and wear the hoodie. That sounds | like a great marketing strategy to stand out from the | boring suit & tie crowd ;) | | EDIT: Marketing agencies already beat me to it: | | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcLsNOMqyD8 | | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9aTGB1KFgII | | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8M71fnJNNeE | vorpalhex wrote: | Wu has been clear that her reasons for her dress style is | her interest in women, not attracting the male gaze. | | One of the traditional hacker values is personal agency - | doing things because you like them, not to fit in or | sell. | | In general we need to take people at their word and not | supply our own beliefs. We diminish ourselves when we | minimize the agency of others. | whimsicalism wrote: | Explain what you mean. I'm not able to connect the | threads unless you're just making a bad pass at | discrediting her. | Jiro wrote: | Having that name and wearing the bikini means that much | of her popularity will be because of sex appeal, with | relatively little being because of the merits of her | actions or her writings. As this is Hacker News, not | Virtual Idol News, this absolutely means that anything | about her that _is_ related to her actions or her | writings should be viewed with the utmost skepticism. | | Also, calling herself sexy and wearing a bikini is | specifically aimed at males, so no defense of her should | include the phrase "white male". Of course most people | paying attention to anything she does are male--she's | doing that deliberately! | | Finally, the Halo Effect is a thing. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halo_effect | 2muchcoffeeman wrote: | She's explained many times how the gay and lesbian scene | that she identifies with works in parts of Asia. I think | she's sincere as she's mentioned her relationships on | Twitter. She's not appealing to males. She's appealing to | specific types of lesbians. | | I think this part of her complaint with western media is | legit. They all just assume that she's doing it for the | views. Ignore the gay and lesbian scene in Asia entirely | to come up with a fake narrative. Completely ignore that | she has done some good work just because of the way she | looks. Then go on and on about inclusivity and LGBT | rights. | | Even Adam Savage's Tested.com seems to have snubbed her. | They requested a few CR-30s be sent over for review but | then <some shenanigans> And the review never came and I | guess they never sent them back to her. | sho_hn wrote: | > Having that name and wearing the bikini means that much | of her popularity will be because of sex appeal, with | relatively little being because of the merits of her | actions or her writings. | | I think that honestly underestimates the amount of work | that goes into being a consistently successful tech- | themed content creator: Wearing a bikini isn't enough to | brave competition and short-lived attention spans in that | space. Being attractive helps in media, for sure, but you | can't go on without putting work into the essential | content for very long. | klyrs wrote: | > Also, calling herself sexy and wearing a bikini is | specifically aimed at males | | Women who are attracted to women exist. It's possible to | think that yourself is sexy without desiring external | attention. What you're doing here is projecting and | victim-blaming. | fxtentacle wrote: | GP: "The amount of [..] anti-[..]white/male sentiments | packed into such a small thread is incredible" | | P: "you really only have to read the comments in pretty | much every thread about her to figure that one out. I | can't even imagine what her inbox must look like." | | And to P I'd like to reply that I agree with GP: It | appears to me that she has voluntarily joined fighting | the anti- white/male fight. | ramadan_steve wrote: | "anti-American/tech/white/male/journalism sentiment". That's | a lot to take out of a story about a woman with the polio. | I'm sad what's happening to this site. | junon wrote: | > yet Naomi seems to expect NPR to act as Martha's personal | insurer and care advocate. | | No. She expects a reputable news outlet to fact check their | own story, especially since they covered most of the same | information the Wired article did _4 years ago_ - which, | naturally, mentioned Wu. | nend wrote: | Fact check doesn't seem to the right phrase here. Naomi | donated collars years ago. Each collar lasts "a few | months". Martha has a "handful left". Martha hasn't been | able to find additional collars. What facts did NPR get | wrong in the article? | | There could be all sorts of reasons NPR didn't mention | Naomi. How did Martha get the collars before Naomi's | donation? How many years of collar donations/purchases is | NPR obligated to mention in their article? Is there anyone | else outraged they didn't get mentioned for providing | collars years ago? | kevmo wrote: | I like NPR as much as the next person, but it is often used | as a propaganda tool, so I think it's valid to question the | underlying reasons behind publishing stories and the slants | they take. | | And yeah, it sounds like NPR should have picked up on the | maker community here. Articles which precede this one by | years bring up Naomi Wu. | https://www.wired.co.uk/article/iron-lung-maker-community | | Given this, I think it's fair for Ms. Wu to have a hot take | on this. | | Highly recommend reading Propaganda by Ed Bernays. I saw it | recommended on HN years ago, so I bought and read it -- it | really helped make me a smarter consumer of news. | Pxtl wrote: | Naomi Wu _really_ hates western journalists and tech-bros, | and justifiably so. She 's been doxxed, accused of being fake | (they think her partner does all the work and she's just his | model/actress), etc. | | So yeah, she has a humongous chip on her shoulder, and maybe | she gets carried away with that anger, but the chip on her | shoulder comes from some legitimate grievances. | | Regardless, she has a lot of respect in the maker space | because she's one of the few people who says "oh yeah, we can | jump in and come up with help for this medical/prosthetic | problem" and doesn't half-ass it. She's very specific about | that - this is one of those cases where Minimum Viable | Product is unacceptable, these items need to stand up to real | life and 24/7 contact with human skin. | vadfa wrote: | Mentally ill person yelling racial slurs on a street corner, | news at 11. | MattGaiser wrote: | I am curious how NPR would even have known about her beyond | trawling Twitter for anything related to Martha. | kevmo wrote: | Reviewing other comments, it looks like NPR either didn't | do a google search or decided to leave out a lot of | relevant parts of this story. | | I think it's fair to discuss NPR as propaganda here. | morelisp wrote: | Propaganda for what, though, in this case? | kevmo wrote: | I am inclined to agree with Ms. Wu's assessment: | | > And of course- when _someone_ does something, but they | aren 't the right kind of _someone_ let 's pretend her | name did not come up at the top of the search when you | fact-checked this story right @NPRHealth ? Just say you | want a straight white American tech bro to do it. | | NPR is rife with bias, if you know how to look for it. I | recommend reading Propaganda by Ed Bernays & then | thinking about why the people who make huge donations to | NPR make those donations (IMO, it's because NPR largely | exists to reinforce the existing social structure). | toomuchtodo wrote: | > IMO, it's because NPR largely exists to reinforce the | existing social structure | | Can you expound on this? I have come to a similar | observation, but would be interested in hearing what | specifically they're reinforcing. | mikestew wrote: | _NPR is rife with bias, if you know how to look for it._ | | At which point you're going to have a serious | confirmation bias problem. How would I know that I know | how to look for it? Easy: I found some. | | "If only you'd open your eyes and look for _the truth_! " | is kinda how that comes across to me. | morelisp wrote: | You're making sweeping general claims about the media | which I agree with, but I'm asking _specifically about | this story._ To the extent I would classify NPR as | propaganda, it 's (currently) for a particular half- | progressive/half-third-way American liberalism that would | love to have a story about a scrappy DIY global supply | chain saving someone in Oklahoma. | | ETA (since I'm rate-limited...): | | > Do tell us more about NPR's liberal bias. | | Sure. By telling these kind of fables about how global | capitalism is actually good for everybody, they're trying | to prevent growing class consciousness that would | eventually force fundamental, revolutionary change to how | we allocate resources. | | Oh wait, you thought I was to the _right_ of NPR? Sorry, | no, that probability distribution is barely | distinguishable from Nazism at this point. Also no one to | the right of NPR would ever use the term "third-way" in | criticism of it. | setpatchaddress wrote: | Ah, that explains your attitude here. Do tell us more | about NPR's liberal bias. | Loughla wrote: | >Sure. By telling these kind of fables about how global | capitalism is actually good for everybody, they're trying | to prevent growing class consciousness that would | eventually force fundamental, revolutionary change to how | we allocate resources. | | YES. I love NPR as a news source, because of the oddball | stories they cover. But they are solidly, solidly in the | 'bootlicker' camp when it comes to how great and | exceptional international businesses are at solving | humanities problems. | themaninthedark wrote: | Youtube https://youtu.be/4VKZTmTP7oY | | Wired https://www.wired.co.uk/article/iron-lung-maker- | community | junon wrote: | And the Wired article is the _first result_ on Google for | "martha iron lung parts". | | Even more, Martha herself commented on her video: https:/ | /www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VKZTmTP7oY&lc=UgyYG8WsY8fN4... | dragonwriter wrote: | > It's a news story about a health patient, yet Naomi seems | to expect NPR to act as Martha's personal insurer and care | advocate. | | No I think Wu just expects [0] NPR not to ignore relevant | facts to construct a misleading narrative. | | > Then Naomi would never have been given the chance to virtue | signal for exposure. | | Naomi Wu is hardly lacking in exposure opportunities or the | ability to exploit them, so even if the basic false dichotomy | you propose wasn't false, it wouldn't really be lose-lose for | NPR and Wu. (NPR and _Martha_ maybe, since the exposure, even | starting in the misleading form NPR presented it, does | probably make it more likely that her issue gets resolved, | but that 's where the false dilemma comes into play, since | the story didn't actually have to be misleading.) | | [0] in the normative, but emphatically not the predictive, | sense of the word. | rootusrootus wrote: | That twitter thread sure doesn't present a good look for NPR. | benchaney wrote: | I disagree. That Twitter thread is a terrible look for the | people participating, but NPR comes out of it looking fine. | They reported the situation from Martha's perspective. If | Martha is worried about being able to find collars why would | it matter that some completely unrelated people on Twitter | think they already solved the problem? Makes no sense. | StevePerkins wrote: | I don't think that Twitter thread presents a good look for | anyone. | | There is no timeline or context given here. So I don't know | who this person is, and what direct interaction they have or | haven't had with person in that article. All I can see is | that this is a YouTuber, with ~2k Twitter followers and the | tagline "It's all about merit until merit has tits". Who is | "working on it", but hasn't shipped the parts yet. And who | feels that NPR (who probably doesn't know she exists) | deliberately cut her out because she's "not a straight white | American tech bro". | | To me, that thread is Twitter in a nutshell. Off the charts | narcism and self-promotion, revolving around race/gender- | charged drama. There may be some information that I'm missing | here. But if you're starting from a place of _NPR_ being too | right-wing or bigoted, then I 've seen enough. | JPKab wrote: | You nailed it. Twitter is filled with a lot of interesting | content, but the dominant "trending" topics are basically | navel-gazing activists masquerading as journalists | obsessing about their own identity (if they are in a | favored group) or desperately using some sacred cow | identity group as a tool to gain status with their peers. | | I deleted my account after I simply asked a question one | day in a thread with a prominent startup founder who | happened to be a Black woman. Someone else on her thread | had stated that she was worried about encouraging her | daughter to learn to code because she felt that nobody | would hire her "due to the extreme racism that was | obviously prevalent in tech." I simply stated that my | company was trying hard to hire folks like her daughter, | and asked what we could do to make people like her feel | welcome and understand that it wasn't a problem at our | company. Then the veil was pulled back on the performance. | The questioner didn't really have a question. She simply | posed it as a performance, and then I was mobbed with | statements telling me that I needed to "Listen and let | Black women speak." These narcissists aren't interested in | solutions, only in gaining status in their silly, secular | imitation of evangelical fundamentalist churches. Replace | "Satan" with "toxic whiteness" and you have Dana Carvey's | church lady on SNL in the 90's. | [deleted] | Cpoll wrote: | > ~2k Twitter followers | | I think you read this wrong. She's follow _ing_ ~2k people, | but she has 185.7K follow _ers_ (and 1.46M subscribers on | Youtube). | | > There may be some information that I'm missing here. | | Other posters have provided a bit more information that | might change your interpretation of why Naomi tweeted this: | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29015822 | | > But if you're starting from a place of NPR being too | right-wing or bigoted, then I've seen enough. | | I agree with your assessment of Twitter being mostly self- | promotion and race/gender-charged drama, but no-one said | "right-wing." I don't think an accusation that any media | outlet cuts out facts that don't fit their narrative can be | dismissed out of hand these days, unfortunately. I don't | have a strong opinion about NPR, but I can see how Naomi | _might_ not fit in the narratives they try to push. But I | acknowledge that I'm being a bit intellectually dishonest, | I'm not bringing any evidence to bear here either. | themaninthedark wrote: | Twitter is a shifty way to present information and to | talk.I looked around and found out that she sent some | collars in 2019. She also made a YouTube video of what she | was doing at the time https://youtu.be/4VKZTmTP7oY the | video shows up if you search 'Martha Iron Lung' so it's not | like it is hidden... | | A 2017 Wired article https://www.wired.co.uk/article/iron- | lung-maker-community states that Naomi was spearheading the | effort then. | SQueeeeeL wrote: | I thought reporters weren't supposed to interfere? If the | patient can't get help, that's still a story... | spacehome wrote: | You're thinking of the Federation. | gambiting wrote: | This isn't national geographic and the article isn't about | wildlife. Reporters have absolutely no such restriction on | them, implied or otherwise. | Zircom wrote: | And in the same vein they also have no obligation to | solve her problems for her just because they choose to | write a story on her. | MattGaiser wrote: | > She has only a handful of collars left. "I really am | desperate," she says. "That's the most scary thing in my life | right now -- is not finding anybody that can make those | collars." | | How do you fact check whether someone can find something? | | Their inability to find something doesn't mean it doesn't | exist. It just means that she personally can't find them. | | And the collars didn't necessarily work either. They were | shipped, not installed/tested. So the problem doesn't seem to | have been solved. | aeyes wrote: | > And the collars didn't necessarily work either. They were | shipped, not installed/tested. | | Are you sure about that? Look at the pinned comment on the | original video from 2 years ago: | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VKZTmTP7oY | masklinn wrote: | > How do you fact check whether someone can find something? | | Looking at the top google hits and previous stories on your | subject[0] seems like the bare minimum fact checking to do? | | > And the collars didn't necessarily work either. They were | shipped, not installed/tested. So the problem doesn't seem | to have been solved. | | Seems pretty logical that they'd have to be refined given | they're made and shipped from china with no access to the | iron lung or ability to travel back and forth personally. | That's something the NPR journo could actually have | assisted with. | | [0] https://www.wired.co.uk/article/iron-lung-maker- | community | HelloMcFly wrote: | > That's something the NPR journo could actually have | assisted with. | | That's not the job of the journalist! Are we to expect | our journalists to solve the problems they report on? | Should every story also turn the journalist into an | advocate - be it legal, healthcare, employment, etc. - | that works on their behalf? | | I think there's room for critique here though the | "assumption of bad faith" runs rampant in this discourse | already. Yet critiquing the reporter for not acting as | their personal local news network "Problem Solvers" | segment isn't the real issue here. | grumple wrote: | The textilist seems to be accusing NPR of not mentioning her, | but Martha herself said she couldn't find anyone to make | them. Was @RealSexyCyborg in contact with NPR? Or Martha? If | anything, it seems the article itself is meant to encourage | someone to provide the help that @RealSexyCyborg admits she | needed someone else to do. How many others were contacted by | Martha but couldn't produce the product at the end? Does each | require an explicit mention? | | Then the accusation that this effort was omitted because she | wasn't a white tech bro is out of left field and frankly, | very unlikely. NPR regularly goes out of its way to provide | viewpoints and credit well outside the "white tech bro" | sphere. | themaninthedark wrote: | I don't know what research was done but it looks like | @RealSexyCyborg had made some and shipped them in 2019... | as well as making a YouTube video about it. | | Seeing as this is a 2021 story, either Martha did not | receive the parts, the parts needed a revision or they did | no research. | | If the parts needed a revision, you would expect the story | to say something like 'an entrepreneur has been working | with Martha to create replacements but they are having | trouble with final fitment.' | | The article: She has only a handful of collars left. "I | really am desperate," she says. "That's the most scary | thing in my life right now -- is not finding anybody that | can make those collars." | | Makes it sound like noone has tried to do anything. So that | leaves someone who has tried to help with the feeling that | they are being ignored either by malicious or incompetent. | rmason wrote: | It may seem strange for younger HN readers to see an iron lung. | When I was growing up they were common. I can remember going to | the Dayton Hamvention, the annual largest gathering of ham radio | operators, and seeing a couple dozen folks in iron lungs being | wheeled past the exhibits. There was no disease more terrifying | to parents than polio. | | I was so young I don't remember getting the shot. My late father | said the polio vaccine was right up there with going to the moon | for scientific accomplishments in his lifetime. | MBCook wrote: | I saw one in person at a medical museum a few years ago. | Terrifying device when you know the history behind it. | | I'm way too young for all this stuff first hand, but I've seen | the pictures of polio wards and documentaries about how | bad/scary it was. Glad I missed it. | technothrasher wrote: | "Dayton Hamvention" | | Ah, now you're making me nostalgic for those childhood trips to | the now demolished Hara Arena with my dad. | spion wrote: | Polio is one of those diseases that remind me we're not really | taking SARS-2 seriously enough. | | From Wikipedia : | | > Up to 70 percent of those infected have no symptoms. Another 25 | percent of people have minor symptoms such as fever and a sore | throat, and up to 5 percent have headache, neck stiffness, and | pains in the arms and legs. These people are usually back to | normal within one or two weeks. Years after recovery, post-polio | syndrome may occur, with a slow development of muscle weakness | similar to that which the person had during the initial | infection. | | SARS-2 binds to ACE2 which is present everywhere in the body [1]. | Loss of smell might apparently be a nervous system invasion. [2] | Brain scans post COVID show brain matter reduction. [3] REM sleep | seems to be disturbed in 4 of 11 long covid patients. [4] | | We've stopped taking this thing seriously with potentially | disastrous consequences | | [1]: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7167720/ | | [2]: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41593-020-00758-5 | | [3]: | https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.06.11.21258690v... | and https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/covid-19-may- | reduc... | | [4]: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33588262/ | bserge wrote: | One can only hope. Imagine if 3 years from now all the | antivaxxers died just like they said the vaccinated would. A | blessing upon human society. Yeah, yeah, deaths are sad. But | let's be honest, the living imbeciles are worse. | | And yeah, flag it. Downvote it. I've had it. My home country is | a fucking joke. You antivaxxers are a joke. Now go waste your | time going through my old comments and flagging them like the | useless waste you are. Didn't think of that before I told you, | did you? Not enough brain cells. | | People are paying 100+ Euros for fake certificates instead of | getting free vaccines. We're sending people to neighbouring | countries for treatment. | | All while the religious establishment yells about the vaccine | being the devil's work and the masses buying it. | | All while they're caught up in corruption scandals haha. Maybe | they've been infiltrated by the Antichrist now? How about that | conspiracy? | | I remember how they said the same shit about biometric | passports. Mark of the devil they said. Delayed their | introduction by a good six months. Didn't kill anyone or damage | their health though. | | All the priests and their believers have a phone in their | pocket and by some miracle the Internet is cheap and fast. | JTbane wrote: | Yep, people seem to forget history. The polio vaccine had | issues when it was rolled out in 1955. No one bats an eye | taking it today because it saves lives. | | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1383764/ | bserge wrote: | "It's an old type of vaccine" - retards. | | If you don't like mRNA, surprise, you can get an old-style | vaccine today! | | Jesus wept and the priests lied. | | That old joke with God and the drowning man should be remade | with a virus lol | sdhfjg wrote: | >No one bats an eye taking it today because it saves lives. | | It saved lives in 1955. No one bats an eye taking it today | because we know it's safe. | throwawaysea wrote: | I understand your sentiment, around people treating different | diseases differently, but I am also not so sure that comparing | polio and SARS-CoV-2 makes sense. Polio created a lot of | psychological fear due to the graphic imagery of children dying | or becoming permanently deformed. The WHO says | (https://www.who.int/news-room/fact- | sheets/detail/poliomyelit...) that 1 in 200 infected with polio | experience irreversible paralysis (usually the legs), and 5-10% | of those with paralysis die, meaning the IFR was 0.025%. The | IFR for COVID-19 is incredibly low for those under 50, as most | of the deaths impacted senior citizens. Even the CDC's | conservative planning scenarios | (https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/hcp/planning- | scena...) use a planning IFR for minors of 20 in 1M infections | (0.002%) - which is an order of magnitude less than polio. | | The side effects you called out (like loss of smell) are rare | to begin with, subside over time for most people, and aren't as | serious as having to live on an iron lung. Additionally, it | isn't clear if "long COVID" is even a real thing or just a | casual/imprecise term for the unknown. My speculation is that | many illnesses like the common cold have similar side effects, | but we're only now rigorously studying and measuring them | because of the prominence of COVID-19 in the public's mind. | | I would also point out that there are potential consequences | from a lot of things we've done in response to COVID. Limiting | social interaction, hiding faces/emotions, reducing oxygen | intake via masks, normalizing government overreach, hurting the | economy, keeping children out of schools, and so on can have | impacts we don't yet understand. And then there's the potential | for vaccines to have some kind of long-term side effect of | their own. My sense of the probabilities and risks is that it | is preferable to take the vaccine, implement some basic hygiene | protocol, and avoid the worst of it. But I also feel there is a | fairly wide spectrum of reasonable choices and policies in this | situation. | | I'm also not sure what you're expecting in terms of taking it | "seriously". COVID is going to be endemic. Everyone will be | exposed to it over time. In terms of government intervention, I | don't think it ever made sense to do more than 'flattening the | curve', and even that was perhaps a step too far since those | who are healthy and under 50 can more or less treat COVID like | any other common illness. It may have even been preferable for | that group to simply contract it and build up antibodies so | that others who are more vulnerable could re-enter society with | a lesser chance of transmission. | hackingforfun wrote: | > those who are healthy and under 50 can more or less treat | COVID like any other common illness. | | Is that true? I thought that changed with the variants? | bigodbiel wrote: | Considering the global reaction to Covid, it is extremely | serious. Anymore and we'd all be living under Beijing style | lockdown and traffic light system | jimmaswell wrote: | We shut down the economy, forced everyone to stay home, made | everyone wear masks, warp speeded multiple vaccines, and still | make people wear masks at the doctor and the post office. The | world has to keep turning at some point. | azinman2 wrote: | And many are fighting all of it every step of the way, even | more not in compliance, etc | tgflynn wrote: | I won't argue you needn't worry about long term covid effects | but I don't think comparison with polio does much to support | that. Polio was known to cause paralysis in some patients since | antiquity while covid is essentially a completely new disease | that we just don't know that much about yet. | spicybright wrote: | I wish anti-vaxxers were more expose to this sort of news :( | api wrote: | You can't reason someone out of a position they didn't reason | themselves into. | Pet_Ant wrote: | Sometimes if you can discover what motivates a person then | expose it to then, in the light of day it loses it's power. A | lot of arguments in couple's counselling resolve this way. | | But that requires listening to them, as people, not | dismissing them. See what what it's really about | gzer0 wrote: | > But that requires listening to them, as people, not | dismissing them. See what what it's really about | | You cannot listen to someone if they do not do the same | back. From my own experience, questions are always | deflected, even simple ones. I want to learn how and why | they think, however, when I propose questions to do exactly | that, it is taken as a personal insult rather than | curiosity. | [deleted] | dang wrote: | " _Eschew flamebait. Avoid unrelated controversies and generic | tangents._ " | | https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html | penjelly wrote: | thanks mods. HN really is the last place left i can go to | have discussions that dont devolve into bickering. | dang wrote: | I wish that were more true but we do what we can. | jsonne wrote: | Perhaps a dumb question but I Googled and looked in the article. | Do people spend 24/7 in iron lungs or simply do "sessions" or | sleep in them? It was unclear to me how they actually function. | tdeck wrote: | An iron lung works by lowering the pressure around your body, | while keeping the pressure around your head at atmospheric | pressure. That gradient pushes air into your lungs, and then | the iron lung raises pressure around your body to squeeze out | that air. | | People who have had polio may lose function in their diaphragm | muscles and require ventilation at all times. An iron lung user | may exit the iron lung temporarily and use some other kind of | ventilator, and some people have learned to force air into | their lungs using the muscles in their mouth and throat without | any machine. As you can imagine the latter can be tiring: | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glossopharyngeal_breathing | retrac wrote: | Depends on the patient and the cause. Some require them 24/7. | | In the case of polio, the nerves controlling the diaphragm are | sometimes affected. This can be partial, with a reduced but | present breathing, or completely absent. | | In either case, but especially when only partial, people can | often adapt when conscious and upright. Other muscles may not | be affected, and they can use non-diaphragm muscles to | expand/contract the rib cage. In mild cases this is just an | assist and provides the extra ventilation for strenuous | activity. In serious cases it's required to keep them | conscious. | | While such adaption becomes an unconscious reflex, it's still | largely suppressed when asleep. | | There are some parallels to how people with obstructive sleep | apnea adapt. They may be able to breathe (e.g. through their | mouth) during the day but at night, the instinctive breathing | process isn't working quite right. | | The result is usually some kind of sleep apnea. Waking up | feeling suffocated and having to will yourself to breathe. In | the extreme, if that reflex doesn't kick in either, it could | cause a hypoxic event, that inhibits breathing even more, and | that's potentially fatal. | jupp0r wrote: | There is no guarantee polio doesn't return as resistance against | vaccines is gaining popularity in society. | tamaharbor wrote: | And why not? I recall during the 2020 presidential election | both Biden and Harris raised concerns about a potential | coronavirus vaccine. | semenko wrote: | Physician scientist here -- this is a unique and somewhat odd | case where Martha prefers to use the iron lung over modern | alternatives. | | She would likely do fine with a modern non-invasive positive | pressure ventilation (NIPPV) approach. | | There are many patients with other illnesses (COPD, ALS, etc.) | that depend on nocturnal ventilation -- most commonly nocturnal | BiPAP (two pressure levels that support respiratory muscles). | mikesabbagh wrote: | I am sure she tried a CPAP or something better suited for her | needs. | | Maybe Sleeping with a mask on your face is more disturbing than | sleeping neck high inside a machine. She definitely tried a | face mask and determined this machine is better. | | But most people on CPAP did not get the chance to try an iron | lung. | | So Maybe this is a chance to create a new product, any | entrepreneurs here? | treeman79 wrote: | Took me a year to get used to cpap. Absolutely hated it. Now | I'm terrified to go without | rootusrootus wrote: | Personally I can't handle a regular CPAP mask. If I didn't | figure out a way to make the nasal mask work for me, I'd | probably end up ditching the CPAP altogether. | Pxtl wrote: | She's slept in an iron lung for over 60 years. I imagine | adjusting to sleeping in a more modern system would be | incredibly difficult. | idiotsecant wrote: | Definitely. Imagine just trying to change how you sleep if | you're a back or side or stomach sleeper. For most people | that would be pretty difficult, I think. It seems like this | is an even more dramatic change. | rootusrootus wrote: | Difficult but hardly undoable. My dad didn't get a CPAP | until he was in his 70s. Turned him into a believer, even | though he had to relearn how to sleep. My father-in-law had | to sleep in an easy chair after his bypass surgery, and | then relearn how to sleep in a bed after that. So it may be | difficult, but people do it all the time especially when it | improves their quality of life. | 14 wrote: | I work in healthcare and see these machines all the time. | They seem way less invasive then a giant metal lung and | would not be hard to adjust to. I wish I had one for days | when I am sick like with a flu they seem like they would | make breathing much easier. | skrbjc wrote: | I wonder why this isn't mentioned anywhere? If she is worried | about not having parts for the iron lung, it's more about her | preference to use it than whether she can live or not, it would | seem. | masklinn wrote: | The article quotes: | | > "I've tried all the forms of ventilation, and the iron lung | is the most efficient and the best and the most comfortable | way," she told Radio Diaries. | | At no point does it say that she _can not_ use any | alternative. | skrbjc wrote: | Whoops, sorry I must have missed that, thanks for pointing | it out. | MattGaiser wrote: | Journalists diagnosing someone and proposing new treatments | seems a bit outside their skillset. | rootusrootus wrote: | OTOH, it would be great if the journalist could take her | experience and bounce it off an expert and report what they | said. Otherwise it's just a biography. | morelisp wrote: | > Otherwise it's just a biography. | | The article is a sample of the PRX show "Radio Diaries". | It's supposed to be a biography. | da_chicken wrote: | Eh, there's a league of difference between "does fine" and | "does well". | | I'm willing to bet she's had many doctors suggest modern | alternatives and that she's tried alternatives, not the least | because iron lungs are generally not produced anymore so | they're more difficult to maintain and can't easily be | replaced. | | However, if she truly prefers it and it's therapeutic and she's | able to maintain the device... what's the problem? "This other | thing is a newer treatment," isn't really a description of | efficacy or appropriateness or therapeutic benefit or patient | comfort or outcome. | | Just because something is old doesn't mean it's bad. A | treatment that's proven to be effective for 50+ years shouldn't | be discarded out-of-hand because newer treatments exist. | teruakohatu wrote: | > "I look at it as a friend, as a very dear friend." | | It seems understandable that a person might become attached to | a device that keeps them alive. | | Also it might be more comfortable for her sleeping without a | mask on, if she is used to the sound of the motor. | poo-yie wrote: | Here's a fascinating and inspiring article about a man who is | confined to an iron lung who is an attorney and uses his computer | while in his iron lung: | | https://www.usnews.com/news/healthiest-communities/articles/... | poidos wrote: | Thanks for sharing this - this line made me particularly | emotional: | | > To this day, the words he recalls her saying make him | emotional: "When I'm dancing with others," she said, "in my | head I'm dancing with you." | scotty79 wrote: | Did you know that polio is survivable in 99.8% of cases and | asymptomatic in 92% (up to 99% by some estimates) of cases? | | Mention this to people that think covid is mild non-issue. | SigmundA wrote: | My grandfathers brother had polio and was crippled for life. | | I always remember how my grandparents talked of vaccines having | seen the effects of polio and smallpox when they where growing | up. They considered vaccines a modern miracle and could not | imagine not getting them. | MBCook wrote: | I've heard the theory that people are much more hesitant to | get vaccines now because they've never seen the terrible | diseases due to the success of vaccines in the past. Sort of | tragedy due to success. | SigmundA wrote: | Thats my take too just based on talking to my grandparents | vs anti-vax friends. | | The anti-vaxxers just have never experienced the direct | impact of a crippling but now easily preventable disease | and what life was like before modern vaccines. | | However they are looking to blame something for an autism | spectrum kid ignoring the obvious which increased and | broader diagnosis along with having kids older than | previous generations. | | No one wants to blame themselves understandably, so | vaccines are a good scapegoat and not getting them is less | risky now days due to the diseases being nearly eliminated | so it all works until these old diseases come back, which | they have. | AnimalMuppet wrote: | Interesting. The vaccines got us to a world where it's | rare that bad things happen - to the point that we kind | of think that nothing bad should ever happen. But when | something bad happens (autism), they blame the thing that | got us to the point where bad things are as rare as they | are. | heavyset_go wrote: | The rate of paralysis is low, too, between 0.05% and 0.5%. | Children in particular had a paralysis rate of 0.1%. | tfigment wrote: | Sadly I don't think facts help these people change their minds. | The opposition is rooted generally in perception and not | truths. Anything can be rejected this way. | the_doctah wrote: | Polio vaccines are a cure. Covid vaccines are not. | SigmundA wrote: | What does that mean? The polio vaccine is considered 100% | effective at 4 doses while 90% at 2. Does a vaccine have to | hit 100% effectiveness at some number of doses to be | considered a cure? | retrac wrote: | Polio vaccines are not a cure. They do not treat the | infection nor the after-effects. | | Also, people who have been vaccinated can still, in | principle, contract polio. Like people with immunity from | previous infection, generally they get a very mild and | asymptomatic case that clears almost immediately. | manquer wrote: | No they are not, no vaccine is 100% effective.[1] | | In the case of Polio there is actually Vaccine derived | poliovirus VDPV[2], the person getting the vaccine is immune, | however he can transmit it to un-vaccinated people for the | OPV version which was administered in the U.S. till 2000 | | OPV is known to cause paralytic poliomyelitis(polio) in 3 | cases per million doses given [3] | | [1] https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/vpd/polio/hcp/effectiveness- | dur... | | [2] https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/vpd/polio/hcp/vaccine- | derived-p... | | [3] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27894720/ | throw10920 wrote: | Huh, there's a (very small) chance to get permanently | paralyzed from the polo vaccine? :| | | Why do people think that it's a good idea to shield vaccine | manufacturers from liability, again? | yupper32 wrote: | If they weren't shielded from liability, would there be | any company willing to take on the risk of administering | the vaccines to 92%+ of the population (US polio vaccine | numbers via CDC)? | | They're shielded from liability because we as a society | have determined that the benefits outweigh the risks with | all the currently recommended vaccines, and that the | companies that develop these vaccines shouldn't be | punished for creating a massively net-good for society. | heavyset_go wrote: | If you have polio and take the polio vaccine, it will do | nothing. It is no cure for polio, it is prophylaxis. | h2odragon wrote: | I hope this isn't a situation where she can't hire someone to | make new collars, for example, because they couldn't be | "certified" soemhow. | | I'm sure there's all sorts of subtleties and issues with keeping | this machine running that aren't apparent at first thought (or | even glance). | | It doesn't seem beyond the bounds of what home brew hardware | hacking can do, even without the lovely set of pre-made suitable | parts the dysfunctional machine is. | spicybright wrote: | I wouldn't be surprised if certification or the like go out the | window seeing how old the tech is. | | I don't even think anyone but the people making the collars | could verify it's safety. | dang wrote: | Past related thread: | | _The Last of the Iron Lungs_ - | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15742901 - Nov 2017 (65 | comments) | | Also: | | _One of the Last People to Live in an Iron Lung Is a Longhorn_ - | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25785650 - Jan 2021 (1 | comment) | | _Reinvented 'Iron Lung' Technology_ - | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22756993 - April 2020 (1 | comment) | | _Ask HN: Where to find specifications for pressure for an Iron | Lung_ - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22582257 - March | 2020 (3 comments) | | _A Callout: Parts for an Iron Lung_ - | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15777702 - Nov 2017 (23 | comments) ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2021-10-27 23:00 UTC)