[Genuine Realist]

What's the 1st S stand for?  Surely not simple.  Nothing simple about that!!

Suppose you're the single parent of a 4yo, 6yo, and 8yo.  How many times do you wait in line with all 3?  Four times.

Or are you going to make your rules less simple?  If you go with the address line (which is more available & less sensitive - can be off driver's licenses, utility bills, etc) instead of birth date, families can go together.

With addresses, publicity of the event can be focused to the right group, everyone knows that everyone in their area is going (for instance, school could close for the day if needed, rather than 366 different absences), etc.  Businesses can expect a slowdown on their neighborhood's day.

Keep It Simple, Stupid.

Birthday lotteries may not be as simple as you'd like, until you compare it with everything else
.
One obvious problem with neighborhoods or zip codes is fraud, bribery, other types of corruption. You'll have some of that with birthdays, but much less.

Distributing by zip code means sending it to the community clinics in those zip codes. We are equipped to give out a lot of vaccine quickly. In zip codes where there is a lot of Covid, the impact on disease spread would be greatest. Your idea that it should not be distributed to these areas because you think it is a sneaky way to give racial preference is unfounded. It is a way to stop the disease where it is most common. It just so happens that the disease is more rampant generally in neighborhoods of color, and therefore in zip codes of more color, although that "color" in Oakland is in the Latin American immigrant community. 

Birthday lotteries are ridiculous. We're not about to cull people from lines based on birthdays. We won't care if a few people show up from other zip codes either. The fact of the matter is that we serve the patients who are catching it and dying from it. Can't imagine the denizens of Piedmont or Atherton descending on our clinic in East Oakland in droves to get the vaccine. Not a ton of Covid in the 94611.

I didn't say a word about race. You have race on the brain. If you'll recall the last time this came up, I was suggesting zip codes and job categories,in lieu of race, and you were in the usual holier-than-thou mode. It turned out that the regulators were thinking along the same lines as me, after which all the faux-liberals stopped posting. 

But I've gone on thinking. The problem, greater or larger, is in the administration. It's not that easy to define job categories, and it is next to impossible to verify zip codes. Some entrepreneur sublets his home for a day or an hour, and writes a thousand leases in a day. The authorities don't have the resources to check. Then you have simple bribery, and all sorts of other schemes beyond my present imagination.

I don't like racial preferences for reasons that are about a century old, and that everyone knows. It has to do with arbitrariness. I'd love the sociological selectors implied in zip code/job category criteria, which aren't arbitrary. But I don't think you can write regulations subtle enough to cover all the loose ends in the thirty days or so that are available, and I don't know how you can realistically enforce them. You're going to end up with a very demoralizing cesspool of upper class corruption, and no easy way to stop it.

So bite the bullet, go birthday lottery, and do your best to do social equity by setting up distribution centers in high incidence neighborhoods. It's not perfect, but it's likely the best practical option.

KISS,capisce?

I challenge you to find a single post where I said that vaccine should be distributed by race. Because I didn't post that. I posted an explanation of why you didn't like Newsom's suggestion of distributing by racial or ethnic group. I don't remember you suggesting zip codes. If you did, great. But now you don't seem to like the idea.

Precisely what I wrote was:
BC,


At this point I'm going to appeal to your skill as a medical scientist, and then call halt. If there is no biological factor that accounts for the statistical discrepancy, then by process of elimination, we must be talking about socio-econometric factors. (Given the of immense proportions number of persons who classify as ethnic minority, it would be amazing if there were any common factor.) You are getting a closer to the Universal Quantifier fallacy than I think you would like. Acknowledging the apparent reality that a disproportionate number of minorities live or work in high risk environments does not mean that they ALL do - and, similarly, that a significant number of Caucasians and Asians (now a disfavored minority) do not. Thus, at the end of the day, the racial metric will lead to a quantum of arbitrariness that is likely to infuriate people who (rightly) see it as arbitrary and themselves as unfairly treated.

So how would I do it? I mentioned I-A (health workers), I-B (classroom educators), and I-C (persons who work in necessary but high risk jobs). If I haven't run out of early vaccines, I'll add a fourth, I-D, people who live in high risk zip codes. Santa Clara County breaks cases down by zip code, so I'll assume others do, too. I'm going to eliminate the disabled, except those with a linked vulnerability, and the zip code also eliminates the rural/urban divide, which was almost as obnoxious as the racial. If you live in a zip code in a rural area, but one with a low incidence rate, why O why do you get priority? (Other than that Newsom wants your vote.) Prisoners are out, because I can't look law abiding Californians in the face if I do that. More of that anon.

If, as I suspect, the high incidence rates in ethnic minorities reflects disproportionate employment in high risk occupations and residence in high risk areas, that categorization will provide an automatic preference arithmetically. I don't think anyone in the public could take exception to that, except the increasing number of nuts on Twitter.

Prisoners? If there is anything experimental or dangerous about first use vaccines, they are free to volunteer, with sentence reductions and parole dates moved up. You always reward courage. That's what I call paying your debt to society.

With that, enough. I'm done with the topic, unless someone comes out of the woodwork to take potshots. (Please .  . . stick to Twitter.)

That summarized a number of earlier replies.

I'd be all for that scheme if I thought it was administratively workable. But I don't think it is, for the reasons stated above. It's too easy for the well off to exploit. I'm sure you know the type.

As for the rest, I didn't write you'd suggested a race based system. I wrote you had race on the brain. It's been nearly 20 years now and I'll stick with that.

---

But when it comes to the logistics and management of vaccine distribution, I believe we have drifted into the area of operations research, a wholly separate field of study, with its own mathematics and expertise. Solving problems that may seem difficult or even insuperable to a lawyer or doctor is the way some people make a pretty good living. With a product for which there is universal demand, and in the distribution of which most major institutions will cooperate completely, the problems are likely to be very easily solvable, for those who know how to approach them.

Point humbly taken.  Operations is indeed a whole different kettle of fish, and I don't mean to trivialize it.  I am still optimistic, but it is not an particularly informed optimism.

BC

I think the product development has been truly outstanding. Even more important, it appears the product works. As Fauci said, the developers have been both lucky and good.

I am glad the DOD is involved in the logistics of the distribution, as they have proven methodologies to accomplish this kind of task. I too am optimistic it will work out fine "in the end". I am a bit concerned about the number of decisions that are being made now, as these decisions do affect how distribution needs to be done. I also worry when you get many different organizations working together for the first time. That usually takes many "engineering readiness runs" to sort out. That may make December a bit rockier in operation than we would hope for, as unexpected problems can crop up. We will get through them, but I would be more calm about this if they had already published a plan that says what happens on D + 7 and had a few full-scale exercises to validate that plan. While the problems that crop up may be "easily solvable", it may take time, and that is what we want to avoid.

There will doubtless be systemic problems early on. That's the nature of human reality. I'm also sure the press will headline every one of them. But in a remarkably short time I think it'll all run quite smoothly, which triumph the press will ignore.

Equitable allocation is another matter. I DON'T think we'll go birthday lottery, and the result will be a lot of unnecessary cynicism and corruption.

[Genuine Realist]

What's the 1st S stand for?  Surely not simple.  Nothing simple about that!!

Suppose you're the single parent of a 4yo, 6yo, and 8yo.  How many times do you wait in line with all 3?  Four times.

Or are you going to make your rules less simple?  If you go with the address line (which is more available & less sensitive - can be off driver's licenses, utility bills, etc) instead of birth date, families can go together.

With addresses, publicity of the event can be focused to the right group, everyone knows that everyone in their area is going (for instance, school could close for the day if needed, rather than 366 different absences), etc.  Businesses can expect a slowdown on their neighborhood's day.

Keep It Simple, Stupid.

Birthday lotteries may not be as simple as you'd like, until you compare it with everything else
.
One obvious problem with neighborhoods or zip codes is fraud, bribery, other types of corruption. You'll have some of that with birthdays, but much less.

Distributing by zip code means sending it to the community clinics in those zip codes. We are equipped to give out a lot of vaccine quickly. In zip codes where there is a lot of Covid, the impact on disease spread would be greatest. Your idea that it should not be distributed to these areas because you think it is a sneaky way to give racial preference is unfounded. It is a way to stop the disease where it is most common. It just so happens that the disease is more rampant generally in neighborhoods of color, and therefore in zip codes of more color, although that "color" in Oakland is in the Latin American immigrant community. 

Birthday lotteries are ridiculous. We're not about to cull people from lines based on birthdays. We won't care if a few people show up from other zip codes either. The fact of the matter is that we serve the patients who are catching it and dying from it. Can't imagine the denizens of Piedmont or Atherton descending on our clinic in East Oakland in droves to get the vaccine. Not a ton of Covid in the 94611.

I didn't say a word about race. You have race on the brain. If you'll recall the last time this came up, I was suggesting zip codes and job categories,in lieu of race, and you were in the usual holier-than-thou mode. It turned out that the regulators were thinking along the same lines as me, after which all the faux-liberals stopped posting. 

But I've gone on thinking. The problem, greater or larger, is in the administration. It's not that easy to define job categories, and it is next to impossible to verify zip codes. Some entrepreneur sublets his home for a day or an hour, and writes a thousand leases in a day. The authorities don't have the resources to check. Then you have simple bribery, and all sorts of other schemes beyond my present imagination.

I don't like racial preferences for reasons that are about a century old, and that everyone knows. It has to do with arbitrariness. I'd love the sociological selectors implied in zip code/job category criteria, which aren't arbitrary. But I don't think you can write regulations subtle enough to cover all the loose ends in the thirty days or so that are available, and I don't know how you can realistically enforce them. You're going to end up with a very demoralizing cesspool of upper class corruption, and no easy way to stop it.

So bite the bullet, go birthday lottery, and do your best to do social equity by setting up distribution centers in high incidence neighborhoods. It's not perfect, but it's likely the best practical option.

KISS,capisce?

I challenge you to find a single post where I said that vaccine should be distributed by race. Because I didn't post that. I posted an explanation of why you didn't like Newsom's suggestion of distributing by racial or ethnic group. I don't remember you suggesting zip codes. If you did, great. But now you don't seem to like the idea.

Precisely what I wrote was:
BC,


At this point I'm going to appeal to your skill as a medical scientist, and then call halt. If there is no biological factor that accounts for the statistical discrepancy, then by process of elimination, we must be talking about socio-econometric factors. (Given the of immense proportions number of persons who classify as ethnic minority, it would be amazing if there were any common factor.) You are getting a closer to the Universal Quantifier fallacy than I think you would like. Acknowledging the apparent reality that a disproportionate number of minorities live or work in high risk environments does not mean that they ALL do - and, similarly, that a significant number of Caucasians and Asians (now a disfavored minority) do not. Thus, at the end of the day, the racial metric will lead to a quantum of arbitrariness that is likely to infuriate people who (rightly) see it as arbitrary and themselves as unfairly treated.

So how would I do it? I mentioned I-A (health workers), I-B (classroom educators), and I-C (persons who work in necessary but high risk jobs). If I haven't run out of early vaccines, I'll add a fourth, I-D, people who live in high risk zip codes. Santa Clara County breaks cases down by zip code, so I'll assume others do, too. I'm going to eliminate the disabled, except those with a linked vulnerability, and the zip code also eliminates the rural/urban divide, which was almost as obnoxious as the racial. If you live in a zip code in a rural area, but one with a low incidence rate, why O why do you get priority? (Other than that Newsom wants your vote.) Prisoners are out, because I can't look law abiding Californians in the face if I do that. More of that anon.

If, as I suspect, the high incidence rates in ethnic minorities reflects disproportionate employment in high risk occupations and residence in high risk areas, that categorization will provide an automatic preference arithmetically. I don't think anyone in the public could take exception to that, except the increasing number of nuts on Twitter.

Prisoners? If there is anything experimental or dangerous about first use vaccines, they are free to volunteer, with sentence reductions and parole dates moved up. You always reward courage. That's what I call paying your debt to society.

With that, enough. I'm done with the topic, unless someone comes out of the woodwork to take potshots. (Please .  . . stick to Twitter.)

That summarized a number of earlier replies.

I'd be all for that scheme if I thought it was administratively workable. But I don't think it is, for the reasons stated above. It's too easy for the well off to exploit. I'm sure you know the type.

As for the rest, I didn't write you'd suggested a race based system. I wrote you had race on the brain. It's been nearly 20 years now and I'll stick with that.

---

But when it comes to the logistics and management of vaccine distribution, I believe we have drifted into the area of operations research, a wholly separate field of study, with its own mathematics and expertise. Solving problems that may seem difficult or even insuperable to a lawyer or doctor is the way some people make a pretty good living. With a product for which there is universal demand, and in the distribution of which most major institutions will cooperate completely, the problems are likely to be very easily solvable, for those who know how to approach them.

Point humbly taken.  Operations is indeed a whole different kettle of fish, and I don't mean to trivialize it.  I am still optimistic, but it is not an particularly informed optimism.

BC

I think the product development has been truly outstanding. Even more important, it appears the product works. As Fauci said, the developers have been both lucky and good.

I am glad the DOD is involved in the logistics of the distribution, as they have proven methodologies to accomplish this kind of task. I too am optimistic it will work out fine "in the end". I am a bit concerned about the number of decisions that are being made now, as these decisions do affect how distribution needs to be done. I also worry when you get many different organizations working together for the first time. That usually takes many "engineering readiness runs" to sort out. That may make December a bit rockier in operation than we would hope for, as unexpected problems can crop up. We will get through them, but I would be more calm about this if they had already published a plan that says what happens on D + 7 and had a few full-scale exercises to validate that plan. While the problems that crop up may be "easily solvable", it may take time, and that is what we want to avoid.

There will doubtless be systemic problems early on. That's the nature of human reality. I'm also sure the press will headline every one of them. But in a remarkably short time I think it'll all run quite smoothly, which triumph the press will ignore.

Equitable allocation is another matter. I DON'T think we'll go birthday lottery, and the result will be a lot of unnecessary cynicism and corruption.