PlagueWatch 2020-23 - Coronavirus

[PackMan97]

While I recognize that the likelihood of severe illness among children under 12 is not high, the thought that I might possibly cause one or more of them to become infected and suffer discomfort of any magnitude or duration is sufficient to deter me from engaging in risky behavior, however tempting. I'm sure that other grandparents here can relate and confirm this sentiment.

I am the parent of two kids under 12 so I feel your pain.

[jimsumner]

As someone who resides in Orlando, I feel obliged to offer a somewhat different perspective:

(a) "The good news is people here are going about their lives pretty normally, if they choose, and most are." Unfortunately, the bad news is that those around here who are exercising their "personal freedom" to dispense with the recommended precautionary behaviors, such as getting vaccinated, using face coverings when indoors among others, maintaining social distancing, and avoiding crowded places, have now succeeded in driving the dreaded COVID numbers -- infections, positivity rates, and hospitalizations -- back up to levels nearly equal to pandemic highs. Here are a few excerpts from today's news reports in Orlando:

Orange County leaders said recently that everyone should wear masks indoors now due to the recent spike in positive cases.

A recent report from the health department said that Orange County is in roughly the 14% range when it comes to the COVID-19 positivity rate.

In Seminole County, officials said the positivity rate went from 14% to 18%. They say that over the last two weeks, there has been a slight increase in people getting vaccinated there.

Related: More than 73,000 new COVID-19 cases reported in Florida, positivity rate increases

During a news briefing on Monday, Orange County Mayor Jerry Demings said one month ago, the COVID-19 positivity rate was at 4.28% in Orange County, and now, as of Saturday, it was at 13.96%.

https://www.wesh.com/article/now-is-...-rise/37127669


AdventHealth is further limiting its elective non-time-sensitive outpatient surgeries as the hospital system continues to deal with “significant and swift” increases in COVID-19 cases in Central Florida.

Hospital officials said Monday that they have 862 people hospitalized with COVID-19. That nears the peak of about 900 the health system saw in January.

They said the daily positivity rate at AdventHealth Centra Care also remains at near all-time highs.

At Orange County’s COVID-19 briefing on Monday, Dr. Victor Herrera with AdventHealth said capacity is being stretched to its limits, causing the hospital system to move its status to level red.

Dr. Victor Herrera with AdventHealth said in-patient numbers of COVID-19 cases is reaching an all-time high. He said capacity is being stretched to its limits. He said AdventHealth has moved its status to level red.
— Christy Turner (@CTurnerWFTV) July 26, 2021

https://www.wftv.com/news/local/oran...MIR37KRGOXC74/

During the noon news report today, WFTV ran a segment showing several patients currently in the hospital suffering from COVID -- one 52-year-old man's wife was crying as he struggled to breathe in the bed beside her, telling the reporter that they didn't take the virus seriously, but were now praying that he could recover so that he could get the vaccine; another 45-year-old man was able to speak through his oxygen mask to say, "Please, this is real, get the shot"; and finally, a middle-aged man told the reporter from his bed, "You can't imagine how bad this is. If you want to feel really awful, just get COVID and see for yourself."

(b) "Floridians are facing the virus and it’s dangerous effects with the calm determination of soldiers going into battle." Ironic that you should use the "going into battle" analogy. Because as reflected by the surging number of hospitalizations, people around here are starting to fall again like soldiers in combat; and unfortunately, not all of those who end up "wounded" ever volunteered for action. Frankly, while I feel enormous sympathy for the innocent bystanders who are made to suffer through no fault of their own, I no longer care about the consequences for those people who could get vaccinated but obstinately refuse to do so, whether as a selfish display of their "personal freedom" or based on a professed apprehension of a medication that literally hundreds of millions of people have received without significant adverse effects.

Here's the way I view the pandemic now: All of the physical, financial, and emotional suffering caused by COVID from January 2020 through April 2021, I blame on the virus; but the adverse effects of COVID that have occurred and continue to occur since the vaccine became available -- at least in those areas where it has been made widely available to the public without charge -- I consider to be primarily the fault of the Refuseniks.

(c) Personal freedom grants you the right to be wrong. I find it difficult to believe that you've thoroughly considered the implications of that statement. I would equate the "personal freedom" to reject the vaccine with the "personal freedom" to drive while intoxicated: You might get lucky and not hurt anyone, or you might only hurt yourself. But you might also unintentionally kill or severely injure innocent people, destroying not only their lives, but permanently derailing the future of their families. Do you honestly believe that "personal freedom" grants anyone the "right" to do such wrongs?

There's an old saying: Your right to swing your fist ends where my nose begins. No freedoms are absolute; they are properly subject to limitations based on the demands of the common welfare. In this case, the common welfare demands that every citizen has a responsibility to protect themselves and their neighbors from exposure to a contagious virus that we know is capable of causing death or long-term debilitating injury.

The simple truth is that those who refuse to get vaccinated are now infringing on the fundamental freedoms of the rest of the people. I want to exercise my personal freedom to travel again, to eat in restaurants again, to go to movies and concerts and sporting events again. But here we are, still wearing masks and living in a safety bubble, all because of the Refuseniks. We were THIS CLOSE to getting out of that dark tunnel; but the jackasses held us back. And now they've got us mired in this crap again. Eff 'em all.

If individual conscience and basic concern for their fellow humans is not sufficient motivation, and it ultimately takes enactment and enforcement of a law to compel compliance, consider mine a favorable vote.

Wonderful post and I agree with every word of it. In addition to the driving-while-impaired analogy, I've also used smoking as an analog. It's one thing to smoke two packs a day and get lung cancer. It's another thing to smoke two packs a day and give someone else lung cancer due to second-hand smoke.

[Section 15]

Do it right or do it twice. Looks like we are going to do it twice.

An' here I sit so patiently
Waiting to find out what price
You have to pay to get out of
Going through all these things twice

'nuff said.

Section 15

[OldPhiKap]

An' here I sit so patiently
Waiting to find out what price
You have to pay to get out of
Going through all these things twice

'nuff said.

Section 15

Can this really be the end?

[Section 15]

Can this really be the end?

Only if you're stuck inside of Mobile with the Memphis blues again.

(and Alabama and Tennessee better get their vaccination rates up!)

[budwom]

Meanwhile, according to the latest CDC infection rate stats, the SEC continues to run away from the pack...Arkansas, Lousiana, Missouri, Florida and Alabama comprise the top five, and illustrating their readiness for the SEC, Oklahoma comes in at number six...Mississippi rounds out the Scintillating Seven. The SEC wannabe, Texas, is knocking at the door of the top 10, coming in at number 11.

[budwom]

OK, so according to the Washington Post: when the sister of the president of Tajikistan died of Covid, her three sons beat the crap out of the health minister and her doctor. They play rough over there.

[Duke79UNLV77]

Could you imagine some Londoner in '43 saying "Screw the greater good, I'm leaving my lights on!"

The comparison isn't that far off when the individual claiming his personal freedom is being infringed upon affects the health of those around him.

George Washington's mandating an early smallpox vaccine actually helped America win its freedom.

https://www.history.com/news/smallpo...olutionary-war

[jv001]

Wonderful post and I agree with every word of it. In addition to the driving-while-impaired analogy, I've also used smoking as an analog. It's one thing to smoke two packs a day and get lung cancer. It's another thing to smoke two packs a day and give someone else lung cancer due to second-hand smoke.

I agree. It was a great post. The people that I know who are not getting the vaccine, use the lame excuse, "I don't know what's in that vaccine". Those same people might not be here if their parents had said the same thing when smallpox was killing millions of people. However, I'm not surprised at their stance on the vaccine because most of them thought Covid-19 was a hoax. There's no vaccine that eradicates stupidity.

[CrazyNotCrazie]

I agree. It was a great post. The people that I know who are not getting the vaccine, use the lame excuse, "I don't know what's in that vaccine". Those same people might not be here if their parents had said the same thing when smallpox was killing millions of people. However, I'm not surprised at their stance on the vaccine because most of them thought Covid-19 was a hoax. There's no vaccine that eradicates stupidity.

Who would have to tell them that everything in the vaccine is ok in order to convince them to get it? The list of scientists, doctors, etc. supporting it is endless. If someone can't have faith in those types of people, then why be a part of normal society - they should just go live on their own little island somewhere. I feel like these people think they are in on some inside information and the rest of us are missing the joke.

I have seen others say that you can't badger these people into getting it. I perhaps understood that in the first few months of the vaccine. At this point, I have zero tolerance - they are not going to get individualized engraved invitations. I'm glad that more and more employers seem to be requiring it.

[Faustus]

I'd add to those awful people who say "I don't know what's in that vaccine', um, you also don't know what's in those hot dogs you shove down your throat every day, and you don't seem too worried about that (but then these people probably aren't big fans of the US Food and Drug Administration either, and think it's companies's Constitutional right to put sawdust in their hamburger to make a few extra pennies per pound profit, too...)

[Mtn.Devil.91.92.01.10.15]

Who would have to tell them that everything in the vaccine is ok in order to convince them to get it? The list of scientists, doctors, etc. supporting it is endless. If someone can't have faith in those types of people, then why be a part of normal society - they should just go live on their own little island somewhere. I feel like these people think they are in on some inside information and the rest of us are missing the joke.

I have seen others say that you can't badger these people into getting it. I perhaps understood that in the first few months of the vaccine. At this point, I have zero tolerance - they are not going to get individualized engraved invitations. I'm glad that more and more employers seem to be requiring it.

The only viable counter-argument to the encyclopedias full of academics who support the vaccine is a huge conspiracy. That's been budding for several years now, and the COVID pandemic is all part of the Big Plan.

Now, to be clear, I'm not in this camp. But those who are see every new development as more evidence of the conspiracy.

Unfortunately, we have had some recent high profile leaders who made a sport of stoking conspiracies and this has only emboldened these people.

I truly don't know how you bring them back into the fold of sanity.

[PackMan97]

Just saw an argument that the mRNA vaccines cause you to make the spike protein in your body, and that's part of COVID-19 virus that damages your cells so these vaccines are making all of these spikes in your body that go on to do all this internal damage to you. Tens of thousands of people have died because of this and many more hospitalized, that's why this person won't be getting the vaccine. Their proof was an article written by an MD about research from another MD.

I seriously have no idea how to talk to people like this.

[Rich]

I'd add to those awful people who say "I don't know what's in that vaccine', um, you also don't know what's in those hot dogs you shove down your throat every day, and you don't seem too worried about that (but then these people probably aren't big fans of the US Food and Drug Administration either, and think it's companies's Constitutional right to put sawdust in their hamburger to make a few extra pennies per pound profit, too...)

I think this was already posted on this thread somewhere, but worth repeating

FFdsadcAS.jpg

[Faustus]

Yikes, indeed! You want fries with that order?

[budwom]

NY Times with an article today about how vaccinated folks are turning angry towards the unvaccinated as they are endangering us all. I can relate to that. Even the Governor of Alabama was lashing out at the unvaccinated the other day.

[johnb]

I don't know how my tv works.

Or my telephone.

Or the internet.

Or my car.

I don't know how my lungs are able to extract the right amount of oxygen from the air and deposit it into the hemoglobin of my blood cells.

I'd go shoot myself, but I'm not exactly sure how guns work.

Or how they make modern bullets.

Or how, exactly, my brain communicates with my trigger finger,

Or how another part of my brain says, "dude, you don't have a gun so shut up."

Or how we choose which people to believe.

I couldn't provide an informative talk on mRNA vaccines,

But what I really don't understand is how people can decide that among all the things they don't understand, that this becomes the place where they decide to become Custer.

_____

By the way, in regards to Wheat, who was brave enough to post stuff that he'd know would provoke skepticism on this board (and that inspired Stray's terrific post), I'd just say that if--in retrospect--I could pick one activity that would have been safe and relaxing, and that I could have done for the past 16 months, four hours per day, it would be to go fishing, maskless, in a bass boat, with a new stranger selected every day from any of the hot zones*. On the other hand, if there's one activity that I wouldn't attend under any circumstances, it would be a maskless, southern indoor fishing trade show--I think I'd have a panic attack in the parking lot.

*that's assuming he or she didn't need me to help load, unload, take his/her fish off the hook, and that we took separate cars, never shook hands, didn't hand each other food/beverages, didn't help the other person with a net, or gave high fives or a bro hug. We'd need to stay rigorously apart. My hunch is that word would quickly get around and soon enough I'd have the boat to myself.

[budwom]

^ I love going to the big fishing and hunting exhibitions...some great stuff there, great people watching, terrific show. Indoor trout pond, too! And travelling raptors!

[Mtn.Devil.91.92.01.10.15]

NY Times article says CDC will recommend masks indoors for vaccinated folks in some areas.

[freshmanjs]

NY Times article says CDC will recommend masks indoors for vaccinated folks in some areas.

Confirming what was obvious at the time, that suddenly removing mask guidance for vax people was a colossal error. If you were trying to run the cdc so as to minimize your own effectiveness and credibility, you would have a tough time doing better than they’ve done.