Seat Belt Use and Vaccine Hesitancy

[Ziberian]

@LSLGuy

But there is another significant difference between peeing in a cup and getting a vaccination.

In a word, one is taking stuff out of your body, the other is putting stuff in. Other than harming your employment, peeing in a cup can’t possibly hurt you. Vaccines are certainly a net benefit for society collectively and also a net benefit for the vast majority of people who receive them. But not everyone benefits; some small number of people have serious problems. It really does suck to be them. And from the narrow individual POV, there’s no way to truly know which group you’ll be in until after it’s too late.

None of the many anti-vaxxers I know truly object on the basis of ‘putting something in their body’, even though they make that claim. I make this statement because they are delighted to put antibody treatments (which they understand just as little), & any other chemicals a doctor offers, into their body when they start feeling bad. Their objection is ‘being told what to do (with the unspoken “by liberals”)’ .

I would agree the battle against workplace drug testing is long over. I’m not sure it was ever much of a battle, more grumbling by a few disgruntled people such as myself. I remember the bewildered response of a potential employer in about 1990 when I explained I couldn’t take the job because I refused to be drug tested. He really wanted to understand, but just couldn’t. His response was not unusual.

[needscoffee]

@Procrustus

Mine never stop. Or, more precisely, it goes for a few seconds, stops, and starts again. Over and over without end

Mine did too, but I googled it and learned how to shut off the repetitions. Now I just get the the first set of beeps.

[Dr_Paprika]

I can understand not wanting to use an untested substance, though I do not think mRNA vaccines apply. What boggles me was (is) the enthusiasm for any quack untested treatment, including bleach or ivermectin worm treatment.

[Hari_Seldon]

To get back to the OP, every law is an infringement on freedom. Including homicide laws. Laws are the price we pay to live in a civilized society. So the question is, what laws are an unreasonable restriction. Although I always use a seat belt my attitude is that if you want to take a chance with your own life, who am I to stop you? If you refuse vaccination, you are taking a chance with lives of others and that is where I draw the line.

[Maserschmidt]

To get back to the OP, I’m hard-pressed to read much correlation, but here’s the graph (I don’t seem to be able to generate a preview version, sorry).

https://public.tableau.com/views/vax_belts_dope/Dashboard1?:language=en-US&:display_count=n&:origin=viz_share_link

[Jackmannii]

Refusal to wear seat belts is generally correlated with limited education and risk-seeking behaviors in general.

There’s a correlation between lower levels of education and vaccine “hesitancy”, but there are significant pockets of more affluent parents with advanced degrees who are “hesitant” or refuse vaccines for their kids altogether. And while some are disdainful of infectious disease risk and willing to
“let 'er rip”, “vaccine-hesitant” parents typically don’t appear to be prone to other risky behaviors like illicit drug use or unprotected sex.*

Also of note: the percentage of non-seat belt wearers in both the U.S. and Canada is in the range of 8-12%, while the vaccine refusal percentage is lower (more like 1.3-6%, depending on who conducts the surveys and what parameters they assess.

*but who knows what really goes on at those Thinking Moms’ Revolution parties.

[outlierrn]

@Jackmannii

Refusal to wear seat belts is generally correlated with limited education and risk-seeking behaviors in general.

There’s a correlation between lower levels of education and vaccine “hesitancy”, but there are significant pockets of more affluent parents with advanced degrees who are “hesitant” or refuse vaccines for their kids altogether.

My entirely unscientific and anecdotal observation in the emergency room, is that our population that would be considered blue collar kids are almost universally vaccinated, but it’s the more affluent types that think their child shouldn’t have to take the risk.

That’s pre-covid, BTW.

[Dr_Paprika]

What if you are driving other people in your car? What if you lose control of your car and damage other people or property?

I understand your point. When I go rollerblading, I wear wrist guards but do not always wear knee guards and a helmet. Motorcycling is more dangerous than riding a bicycle for most roadways. There is a debate about where these lines should be which should involve a limited amount of personal agency. But wearing a helmet is tougher than using a seatbelt for most people. I think these laws make a lot of sense in most situations.

[Dr_Paprika]

I wonder if people would wear their seat belt if you promised free ivermectin.

[Treppenwitz]

@Procrustus

I’m surprised we’re still seeing low seatbelt uses some places. Almost all cars have very annoying buzzing and beeping if a seat belt isn’t used.

My (British) VW Passat won’t release the brakes until you buckle up. If there’s an over-ride, I’ve never found it.

j

[mixdenny]

@Maserschmidt

By law the seatbelt warning only has to run for 4-8 seconds. I don’t know whether warning systems actually do go on longer than that, but I suspect many don’t.

The gong in our 2021 Rav4 not only goes on forever, it increases in speed and volume. It is impossible to ignore. The wife is sometimes a bit slow when the first single warning “ding” sounds and fumbles the latch so it gets to the loud part.

[LSLGuy]

I realize seatbelts on school buses is a bit of a hijack to the thread’s main premise, but the thread seems to have petered out a couple weeks ago, so IMO not much harm in reviving the hijack.

@engineer_comp_geek

@Dr_Paprika

why not in school buses?

Basically because it’s a solution in search of a problem.

Unlike cars, school buses are very large and very heavy. Fatalities in school buses are extremely rare. Sure, once in a while a bus will end up getting creamed by a semi or something like that. But for the most part, kids aren’t getting killed in school bus accidents. And let’s face it, if a bus gets creamed by a semi, those seat belts probably aren’t really going to help much, if at all.

So here’s the deal. Go down to ye ol local school board, and convince them that they need to spend tens of thousands of dollars to put seat belts on their buses, knowing that there is a very good chance that there won’t ever be a single life saved by them.

Seat belts on buses is one of those things that intuitively seems like a good idea, but it’s fixing a problem that isn’t really a problem.

Airplanes take off and land at speeds significantly faster than school buses drive, so if a plane skids off the runway and crashes into a field, it’s a much bigger deal than if a school bus skids off of the road. Comparing airplane seat belts to school buses is definitely an apples to pumpkins comparison. School buses also don’t tend to throw you into the air if they ride through an air pocket. A plane, on the other hand, will easily throw you out of your seat and smash your head against the overhead storage compartment. When the pilot turns on the fasten seat belt sign, it’s a good idea to do it.

I personally would separate the school bus issue out from your other issues. Seat belts on school buses is a completely different issue and has nothing to do with attitudes or freedoms.

(ETA: Ninja’d! Oh, well, I typed it all out so I’m posting it anyway)

ecg I believe everything you said. And agree with it. I suspect the cost / benefit analysis for seatbelts on school buses doesn’t begin to pan out. But I stumbled on something interesting today while looking up aircraft accidents on the NTSB website…

NTSB Reiterates Call for Lap and Shoulder Seatbelts in All School Buses following a head-on collision that killed the bus driver and one student.

The actual accident report is

HIR2206.pdf

There are some interesting statistics on school bus mishaps starting on page 38 and analysis of seatbelt benefits starting on about page 40.

The NTSB in general is pretty good, though far short of infallible. And sometimes they do ask for things that aren’t very cost-effective. But it seems seatbelts on schoolbusses remains an idea that will not die.