Red Mosquito

verb_to_trust wrote:Having enough syringes on hand for the whole country immediately upon vaccine approval doesn't seem like a problem when you factor in there would clearly be no plan to get everyone jabbed in an organized fashion all at once. They'd do health care workers, at risk populations, and so on.

elliseamos wrote:If $18M gets you 50M syringes, then $83M is going to come up short about 600M syringes. No?

McParadigm wrote:

elliseamos wrote:If $18M gets you 50M syringes, then $83M is going to come up short about 600M syringes. No?

I admittedly left this part out, but the article specified that if all of the orders are fulfilled as placed (unlikely), it would amount to around 300 million syringes.

Simple Torture wrote:lenny, your response?

96583UP wrote:i expect private sector U.S. companies could just step up and start making and selling these to health care providers without relying on the U.S. government to play some role if there is a viable vaccine and market demand

McParadigm wrote:

96583UP wrote:i expect private sector U.S. companies could just step up and start making and selling these to health care providers without relying on the U.S. government to play some role if there is a viable vaccine and market demand

Yeah, it’ll probably just be like how we postponed reaching out to American PPE companies until they’d already signed contracts with other nations, and then they sold $60 million worth of ventilators, masks, and garments to China alone while states competed with each other for the scattered remnants, nurses reused contaminated masks, and we made charts to decide who gets a ventilator. Pretty cool.

HONG KONG—The U.S. declared its formal opposition to a swath of Chinese claims in the South China Sea, in an unusually direct challenge to Beijing’s efforts to assert control in the strategic waters.

Announcing the policy shift on Monday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo characterized the decision as an effort to uphold international law against what he called a “might makes right” campaign by China to coerce and intimidate its Southeast Asian neighbors into ceding their interests.

While Washington has previously said it sees Beijing’s expansive sovereignty claims over most of the South China Sea as unlawful, the U.S. is now officially rejecting specific Chinese claims for the first time, according to diplomats familiar with the matter.

The Trump administration has recently ramped up naval operations to challenge the claims. This month, the U.S. sent two aircraft carriers to participate in one of its largest naval exercises in recent years in the South China Sea—at the same time that China was holding drills in the area.

“The world will not allow Beijing to treat the South China Sea as its maritime empire,” Mr. Pompeo said.

Washington’s new stance on the South China Sea disputes could exacerbate an escalating row with Beijing on trade, technological competition, China’s efforts to tighten control over Hong Kong and its treatment of ethnic Uighurs and other Muslim minorities in the region of Xinjiang. The practical implications of the policy shift weren’t immediately clear, though it could portend tougher U.S. efforts to challenge disputed Chinese claims through military, diplomatic or other means.

While Washington didn’t weigh in on competing claims over islands and other land features, the announcement marks a departure from past U.S. practice of not taking sides on maritime disputes in the South China Sea, a stretch of resource-rich waters that hosts vital shipping lanes. Beijing’s claims there overlap with those of six governments, including five Southeast Asian countries. The U.S., which doesn’t have claims in these waters, has generally called on rival claimants to resolve their disputes peacefully and in accordance with international law.

“America stands with our Southeast Asian allies and partners in protecting their sovereign rights to offshore resources, consistent with their rights and obligations under international law,” Mr. Pompeo said.

96583UP wrote:me too

that will mean we are close to out of this mess

and your hospital can get back to the elective surgeries America badly needs to get the hospital system solvent again:

breast implants

96583UP wrote:read 'em and weep, boys

HONG KONG—The U.S. declared its formal opposition to a swath of Chinese claims in the South China Sea, in an unusually direct challenge to Beijing’s efforts to assert control in the strategic waters.

Announcing the policy shift on Monday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo characterized the decision as an effort to uphold international law against what he called a “might makes right” campaign by China to coerce and intimidate its Southeast Asian neighbors into ceding their interests.

While Washington has previously said it sees Beijing’s expansive sovereignty claims over most of the South China Sea as unlawful, the U.S. is now officially rejecting specific Chinese claims for the first time, according to diplomats familiar with the matter.

The Trump administration has recently ramped up naval operations to challenge the claims. This month, the U.S. sent two aircraft carriers to participate in one of its largest naval exercises in recent years in the South China Sea—at the same time that China was holding drills in the area.

“The world will not allow Beijing to treat the South China Sea as its maritime empire,” Mr. Pompeo said.

Washington’s new stance on the South China Sea disputes could exacerbate an escalating row with Beijing on trade, technological competition, China’s efforts to tighten control over Hong Kong and its treatment of ethnic Uighurs and other Muslim minorities in the region of Xinjiang. The practical implications of the policy shift weren’t immediately clear, though it could portend tougher U.S. efforts to challenge disputed Chinese claims through military, diplomatic or other means.

While Washington didn’t weigh in on competing claims over islands and other land features, the announcement marks a departure from past U.S. practice of not taking sides on maritime disputes in the South China Sea, a stretch of resource-rich waters that hosts vital shipping lanes. Beijing’s claims there overlap with those of six governments, including five Southeast Asian countries. The U.S., which doesn’t have claims in these waters, has generally called on rival claimants to resolve their disputes peacefully and in accordance with international law.

“America stands with our Southeast Asian allies and partners in protecting their sovereign rights to offshore resources, consistent with their rights and obligations under international law,” Mr. Pompeo said.