[Draft 2] - Repeal 389: Rights of the Quarantined

[Simone Republic]

Motivation

Target: https://www.nationstates.net/page=WA_pa ... /council=1
Original debate topic: viewtopic.php?f=9&t=388551

What is truly horrifying about this resolution is not the lack of comfort for those quarantined, it is that the drafting basically allows anyone with a technically incurable disease (HIV comes to mind) to be permanently locked up. (This came from my reading of the target, it's not a point of view from Kaschovia's version). For some reason this point did not seem to have come up in discussions on the original back in 2016 (edit: see also Umeria's comment below, Umeria is now credited as a co-author).

Draft 2 has amended for explicitly mentioning HIV. (I also have non-infectious tuberculosis in mind but I used hepatitis B as the example, basically chronic communicable diseases that cannot be easily transmitted).

Replacement

Draft replacement:
viewtopic.php?f=9&t=558372

Kaschovia's/Tinhampton's replacement:
viewtopic.php?f=9&t=536607

Note that my draft replacement includes much less use of quarantine facilities, because I don't think it's possible to quarantine say 10% of your population if they all catch Covid.

Continuing

viewtopic.php?f=9&t=536266
This is continuing from a previous Kaschovia resolution (I told him I'd continue with it). Since Kasch's response was "I don't really have the time at the moment to try WA stuff" and I'd rather get this thing off the books sooner, here is the alternative.

Draft 2

The World Assembly,

Affirming the necessity for international cooperation in case of outbreaks of communicable diseases;

Noting relevant resolutions regarding epidemics and diseases in force, including GARs 53, 320, 492 and 518;

Concerned, however, that the target resolution, GAR389, defines in clause (1) a "serious disease" as merely a disease which is "harmful and contagious enough" to need quarantine in case of an outbreak;

Alarmed that this definition does not make exceptions for diseases with common vaccines to mitigate its impact, such as influenzas and coronavirus diseases;

Anxious that clause (4)(a) merely requires that the infected are packed into quarantine facilities and that measures are taken to protect people administering treatments in clause (4)(c), but not on protecting infected individuals from each other, nor for any minimum living standards in quarantine facilities, other than vague promises on well-being in clauses (6)(b) and "urging" for some level of comfort in clause (7);

Horrified that clause 4(d) assumes that treatments that result in a complete cure actually always exist for some communicable diseases, such as the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) or hepatitis B, due to the use of the "ceases to be an infected person" wording, at the same time offering no clear pathways for release from quarantine, and ignoring measures to prevent the spreading of such viruses to other individuals (such as through safer sex);

Truly flaggergasted that the aforesaid drafting issue in clause (4) forces WA states to isolate individuals that test positive for HIV and other similarly incurable communicable diseases to be placed in quarantine ("(r)equires that all member nations, to the best of their capability") until they die in their quarantine facilities, since no treatment that makes them "ceas(e) to be an infected person" is widely available;

Also noting for the record that the medical ethics board of EPARC as established in clause (6) duplicates with functions of the World Health Authority, and creates an unnecessary administrative burden;

Looking forward to a suitable replacement for this highly flawed resolution at the earliest opportunity;

Hereby repeals the target resolution, GAR389 "Rights of the Quarantined".

Co-author: Kaschovia, Umeria

[Tinhampton]

I continue to support this repeal. (Despite my reservations about the penultimate clause; I do think the EPARC MEB may be useful for future ventures. I should know.)

[Simone Republic]

I continue to support this repeal. (Despite my reservations about the penultimate clause; I do think the EPARC MEB may be useful for future ventures. I should know.)

I think the penultimate clause was from Kaschovia so I have kept it in for now. But yeah, they are gnomes etc so having an extra committee isn't hugely annoying.

[Barfleur]

"Strongly support. Kill it with fire. I do wish people would spend less time making specious arguments about italicizing words and whatnot, and more time noticing dangerous flaws in proposals. I can dream, can't I?"

[Bananaistan]

"Support. The quarantined should not have rights."

[Barfleur]

"Support. The quarantined should not have rights."

"But what if they are good socialists who want nothing more than to get back to work... and not war criminals, rapists, and other scumbags?"

[The Overmind]

Will weigh in on whether this is worthy of support when the replacement draft actually exists.

[Simone Republic]

Draft 1

The World Assembly,

Affirming the necessary need for international cooperation in case of outbreaks of communicable diseases;

Concerned, however, that the target resolution defines in clause (1) a "serious disease" as merely a disease which is "harmful and contagious enough" to need quarantine in case of an outbreak;

Alarmed that this definition does not make exceptions for diseases with common vaccines to mitigate its impact, such as influenzas and coronavirus diseases;

Anxious that clause (4)(a) merely requires that the infected are packed into quarantine facilities and that measures are taken to protect people administering treatments in clause (4)(c), but not on protecting infected individuals from each other, nor for any minimum living standards in quarantine facilities, other than vague promises on well-being in clauses (6)(b) and "urging" for some level of comfort in clause (7);

Truly horrified that clause 4(d) assumes that treatments that result in a complete cure actually exist for some communicable diseases, such as immunodeficiency viruses, due to the use of the "ceases to be an infected person" wording, and has no clear pathways for release, as opposed to measures to prevent the spreading of such viruses to other individuals (such as through safer sex), giving states the opening to isolate those that test positive for immunodeficiency viruses until they die;

Noting that the medical ethics board of EPARC as established in clause (6) duplicates with functions of the World Health Authority, and creates an unnecessary administrative burden;

Looking forward to a suitable replacement for this highly flawed resolution at the earliest opportunity;

Hereby repeals the target resolution, GAR389 "Rights of the Quarantined".

"Support. The quarantined should not have rights."

(OOC)

Try getting quarantined as I have done.

I have also removed the italics on the word "horrified"

Will weigh in on whether this is worthy of support when the replacement draft actually exists.

Working on it.

[Umeria]

While I'll be sad to see my resolution go, I can't find fault with your arguments.

[Simone Republic]

While I'll be sad to see my resolution go, I can't find fault with your arguments.

(OOC)

Sorry about that. Do you want to be credited for the repeal as a proof-reader? I am generally fairly relaxed about crediting.

I read through the entire 2016 debate on this topic and I am still a bit surprised that no one caught the HIV issue. (I worded the resolution slightly loosely on this since I am aware there had been a small handful of cases where HIV appears to have been completely removed from a human body, but it's highly experimental at this stage, and of course for Roleplay reasons, some nations may have already cured HIV)

[Umeria]

While I'll be sad to see my resolution go, I can't find fault with your arguments.

(OOC)

Sorry about that. Do you want to be credited for the repeal as a proof-reader? I am generally fairly relaxed about crediting.

That would be nice, thank you. Although this does obligate me to point out that "necessary need" in the first clause is kind of repetitive - I'd go with "Affirming the necessity" or "Affirming that international cooperation is needed". I don't see any other issues right now.

I read through the entire 2016 debate on this topic and I am still a bit surprised that no one caught the HIV issue. (I worded the resolution slightly loosely on this since I am aware there had been a small handful of cases where HIV appears to have been completely removed from a human body, but it's highly experimental at this stage, and of course for Roleplay reasons, some nations may have already cured HIV)

You might want to take a look at the thread for the original resolution. HIV actually came up frequently, but in hindsight it was never really addressed beyond me saying "such and such clause will take care of it." This post boils it down, I think:

OOC: To put this into perspective, imagine what would happen in real life if your RL nation's government set aside some concentration camps quarantine facilities in most urban areas and made everyone with any sort of disease that can have some sort of harmful effects (from HIV to hemorraghic fevers to influenza to chicken pox to strep throat to syphilis) to go in there, presumably until they got better or died. Except those whose disease can't be cured, would never be allowed to leave.

Most of those people would still be living a normal life in the quarantines, except for the ones where the disease has gotten serious, in which case it would make sense for them to be under immediate health supervision. It's not going to look like oppression if the government shows them a picture of an extremely ill person and says "we're making quarantines so this doesn't happen to you too" to all the non-infected individuals. In many cases of incurable contagious diseases, there are vaccines or other treatments that can prevent the spread of that disease, and thus stop it from being contagious. Even for the incurable unpreventable ones, it's not like infected individuals could be trapped in a quarantine for the rest of their life even though they feel fine; eventually the significantly harmful long-term effects will set in and they'll be glad they're in a health facility(unless it's a mental disease, but then they won't really be themselves anymore).

That's nice, me from 2016... but you didn't actually put any allowances for these "other treatments" in the determination for who gets to be let out of the quarantine. Ceasing to be an infected person and the epidemic ending are the only exits. The only thing that was fixed between that post and the final resolution's passing was the restriction of diseases to the seriously harmful ones, but for those diseases, things work pretty much exactly as Ara described.

This and the points you bring up about standard of living are the strongest arguments for repeal, in my opinion.

[Simone Republic]

(OOC)

Sorry about that. Do you want to be credited for the repeal as a proof-reader? I am generally fairly relaxed about crediting.

That would be nice, thank you. Although this does obligate me to point out that "necessary need" in the first clause is kind of repetitive - I'd go with "Affirming the necessity" or "Affirming that international cooperation is needed". I don't see any other issues right now.

Changed and credited.

*snip*

That's nice, me from 2016... but you didn't actually put any allowances for these "other treatments" in the determination for who gets to be let out of the quarantine. Ceasing to be an infected person and the epidemic ending are the only exits. The only thing that was fixed between that post and the final resolution's passing was the restriction of diseases to the seriously harmful ones, but for those diseases, things work pretty much exactly as Ara described.

This and the points you bring up about standard of living are the strongest arguments for repeal, in my opinion.

Noted this line in the OP (as I spell out the rationale on repeals quite clearly)

(IC)

"I like the ""Umeria - We start with U" slogan from the Umeria delegation. Do we have something similar?" An assistant asks.

"We start with S and go downhill from there?"

[Umeria]

"I like the ""Umeria - We start with U" slogan from the Umeria delegation. Do we have something similar?" An assistant asks.

"We start with S and go downhill from there?"

"Ah, a fan of President D'Annain's wit! I can't promise to match it, but... 'Simone says, "You're in good hands"'?"

[Simone Republic]

"I like the ""Umeria - We start with U" slogan from the Umeria delegation. Do we have something similar?" An assistant asks.

"We start with S and go downhill from there?"

"Ah, a fan of President D'Annain's wit! I can't promise to match it, but... 'Simone says, "You're in good hands"'?"

(IC)

"What is our motto or slogan again?" An ursine assistant asks.

"What, for The North Pacific? That's a different multi-verse over in GP."

"Doesn't matter. What was it?"

"For All of Us".

(OOC)

Last-ish bump.

[Simone Republic]

Another bump.