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Small-Scale Question Sunday for September 29, 2024

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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In high-trust societies with usual first-world levels of state capacity, any disease with a safe and effective vaccine will be eliminated. The return of measles in the US and UK is visible evidence of falling social trust in exactly the same way that locked cabinets in stores are.

The thing that is unusual about smallpox (and, hopefully, polio) is that we committed the required resources to vaccinate everyone even in hard-to-reach parts of the third world.