• Coach@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Ain’t that a bitch. One virus took his body. Another took his life.

      Both are preventable through safe, effective, and widely available vaccines. Vaccinate yourselves and your children, friends.

      • davel [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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        1 year ago

        Currently COVID-19 is not preventable through vaccination on its own, especially not at the currently recommended once-per-year schedule, because they don’t last anywhere near that long.

      • Kbobabob@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        The COVID vaccine doesn’t prevent you from getting COVID. It just mitigates the symptoms. You can still get it and spread it.

        • Coach@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          And what do you think people die from? The symptoms, knucklehead.

          • Kbobabob@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            I’m aware of that but the comment I replied to says the virus is preventable. You really think I understand how the vaccine works but not what people die from or did you just need to make a degrading comment?

          • smeenz@lemmy.nz
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            1 year ago

            Wow, did you get up on the wrong side of the been this morning ?

        • Gabu@lemmy.ml
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          1 year ago

          In other words, it does exactly the same as any other vaccine…

  • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org
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    1 year ago

    I feel like this guy alone undercuts the whole meritocracy narrative quite a bit. I know the defenders of that worldview would go “okay, but except for all the exceptions…”, but in a lot of ways it’s just a more extreme version of the stuff that puts people in normal poverty.

    Also, vaccinate your damn kids, everyone.

    • YurkshireLad@lemmy.ca
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      1 year ago

      Send this story to every anti vaxxer and ask if this is what they want their kids to suffer this.

      • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org
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        1 year ago

        I have a wall right here if I need to bang my head against something. I don’t know, maybe somebody else reading has the gift of convincing irrational people of things, but I do not.

        I brought it up partly just to vent, and partly for any fence sitters that might be lurking and hadn’t made the connection.

        • YurkshireLad@lemmy.ca
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          1 year ago

          I probably didn’t make it obvious, but I was talking in the general sense of “everyone should do this”. My bad…

          • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org
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            1 year ago

            Ah, okay. I’m still not sure if that would accomplish anything, though. They need deprogramming or something, not more yelling at.

      • Crikeste@lemm.ee
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        1 year ago

        They’ve already decided they don’t care for the suffering of other people’s children, the step to not caring about their own isn’t a far one.

      • Sizzler@slrpnk.net
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        1 year ago

        A classic case of success against all the odds, to manage to become a lawyer at all is a challenge let alone when you live in an iron lung. It’s an argument for people saying that no matter who you are in society you can succeed and that (therefore) society isn’t racist/classiest etc.

  • WarmSoda@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    Mr Alexander was a far stronger man than I could ever be. 70 years in an iron lung? I would be begging for release within a year or two max.

    • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org
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      1 year ago

      I’m guessing it’s a bit easier if you start as a kid. It’s just what life is like to some degree. Still, can you imagine how much FOMO you would have, literally confined to a barrel? Puberty must have been extra weird for him.

      • Drusas@kbin.run
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        1 year ago

        Puberty must have been extra weird for him.

        He was paralyzed from the neck down. Puberty was probably mostly a squeaky voice and inconvenient growth spurt.

        • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org
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          1 year ago

          I mean, to be direct about it, desire comes from the brain. The poor dude just didn’t have a body to then be horny with. Also, genitals operate on a slightly different circuit, so they often can remain functional even if voluntary things have been knocked out.

      • ripcord@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Agreed on it probably being easier if it’s something you’re used to and not actively in pain.

        Not everyone gets a lot of FOMO, so I could imagine that might also not be much, though.

        I mean, maybe you just mean frustration/sadness that he can’t do as much as other people, or to do specific things he wants to do. And I could imagine that could be just incredibly tough. Like all sorts of people with severe, debilitating conditions. But FOMO is kinda a different (more childish) thing than that.

    • Kalothar@lemmy.ca
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      1 year ago

      He apparently did regain the ability to breathe a little bit and would leave the iron lung for short periods of time

    • El Barto@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Imagine if you find out that normal humans could breathe underwater, and there 100 billion people living underwater. Us 8 billion people unable to live underwater are the “iron lung kids”.

      The all say “imagine not being able to ‘fly’ underwater, or not riding a gigantic squid - I would kill myself to end my misery!”

      What would you respond to that? I’d be like “eh, must be nice, but I’ve lived above water all my life. It makes no difference to me.”

        • Mastengwe@lemm.ee
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          1 year ago

          Others said there’s video of him up and walking a few years back, so I think you might be wrong here.

  • AutoTL;DR@lemmings.worldB
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    1 year ago

    This is the best summary I could come up with:


    The disease left him unable to breathe independently, leading doctors to place him in the metal cylinder, where he would spend the rest of his life.

    “Paul Alexander, ‘The Man in the Iron Lung’, passed away yesterday,” a post on a fundraising website said.

    His brother, Phillip Alexander, remembered him as a “welcoming, warm person”, with a “big smile” that instantly put people at ease.

    Phillip said he admired how self-sufficient his brother was, even as he dealt with an illness that stopped him performing daily tasks such as feeding himself.

    Paul’s health deteriorated in recent weeks and the brothers spent his final days together, sharing pints of ice cream.

    After years, Alexander eventually learned to breathe by himself so that he was able to leave the lung for short periods of time.


    The original article contains 583 words, the summary contains 133 words. Saved 77%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!