Data also shows men to die from covid at higher rates than women - would you support men receiving a generic +1 point on the scoring system to account for this sociological fact? Would Democratic lawmakers or the left-leaning public health officials who come up with these systems?

I mean, after all, there's a long-standing tradition of gender inequality in terms of health outcomes, with men being at a disadvantage in the overwhelming majority of categories. Social norms and expectations have pushed men into more dangerous jobs and lifestyles for generations, so why not disadvantage women a little to make up for this """injustice"""?

This post was edited by Black XistenZ on Jan 24 2022 04:02pm

Sex is absolutely a factor to consider when addressing medical outcomes. Do you think this is some kind of gotcha?

See above.

The difference is that there are objective biological differences between men and women that cause different outcomes. Different anatomies justify a different response, and that's a reasonable weighting factor.
That kind of biological distinction doesn't exist for race.



and that's the thing, in the absence of a biological explanation, using sociological data to justify explicit racial discrimination is opening up a can of worms, one that should stay shut for good reason. I really don't see the difference in the arguments for racial profiling or affirmative action or all the way up to eugenics and nuremberg codes. Its all based on that same concept, just taken to various applications. If the fine detailing can't be figured out, then race really isn't an acceptable substitute. The perils are obvious, the issue so toxic it can only do more harm than good, and the benefits are what? Dubious at best. Its hardly microtargeting treatments to their best applications to judge people by their skin color, given how little that has to do with biology.
Besides, I think this would all benefit from some very critical examination of the data that tries to isolate for already known (and already counted) factors like diabetes, heart disease, obesity, socio-economic means and lifestyle, smoking status, etc etc. If they are also disparate by race, then they're being double counted. I'd be suspicious that there isn't as big a mystery when it comes down to isolating variables, more just an unwillingness to explore it

it shouldn't be controversial to say "When in doubt, don't discriminate by race". Should be a no-brainer.

This post was edited by Goomshill on Jan 24 2022 04:26pm

It would only be potentially double-counted if other socio-economic factors are part of the assessment. Per the article you linked in the OP, I didn't see what other criteria were being examined. As I said earlier though, I don't think the use of race as it has been described and understood by me is the most-beneficial away to approach the sociological pieces of triage. There are, I assume, better ways to hone in on the sociological pieces of health outcome disparities that also would end up capturing much of the demographics that the original tool described in the OP was/is attempting to capture.

well we can already know for a fact that several of the other factors used for the point scores have racial disparities. 49.6% obesity for black vs 42.2% for white vs 17.4% for asian. 11.7% diabetes black, 7.5% white, 9.2% asian. etc etc. They list a bunch, like chronic kidney disease, hypertension, arrhythmia, liver disease, etc. Its different conditions for each of the networks.

Courts have usually used the presence of neutral, non-racial metrics as a significant factor when racial policies get challenged. Whether its to reinforce it when they explain it as causal factors, or when the authorities should be using non-racially targeted policies and the courts can tell them to do so as a way to dodge a controversial issue. Think that's been used in gerrymandering among other issues.

But I would be interested in what non-medical data they're using as part of the triage process, such as financial status, housing status, zip code, etc.

We will. For those who will listen. For those who won't, or hostile outsiders, you'll be made to listen. Just a matter of time

The government at ALL levels should be forbidden from collecting, using, or analyzing ANY data related to race. This includes the census because the mere observation of racial data is by definition a discriminatory act. As Barack Obama once said, there's no black America or white America...there's only the United States of America.

Are you high?