Discussion in Boston about masks in schools yesterday (where the state is only publishing guidelines)
5 Likes
It looks like the forum is truncating the web address. Iāll post SS below.
6 Likes
Interesting story on how the Provincetown outbreak was caught and investigated so quickly.
8 Likes
Very interesting. Thanks for sharing.
I can totally see this. TBH, reading some peopleās cavalier and dismissive comments on Chat makes me feel relieved that i wonāt have to mingle with these people in the midst of a pandemic. Between the Disney gifts cards Iāve been buying at discount, the credit for Boo Bash, and the ecredit for airfares, I feel kind of locked in to try again next year. But the bloom is def off the rose at this point. 
7 Likes
When you are ready to start planning again start a trip planning thread. We will post pictures of yummy food and amazing nighttime views. We will get you excited!
6 Likes
So much Covid news lately! There are endless things in my notes from the last 2 weeks thatās interesting, but in terms of ānews you can useā, here are 3 slides from Fridayās Baylor College of Medicine update:
Where we are:
Where he thinks weāre going overall for the US (estimated peaks of cases and deaths from Delta wave):
What he recommends:
7 Likes
When is the peak again?
COVID cases in Florida set another daily record
This is the third time in the past week that Florida broke its previous record for COVID cases detected in a single day. In addition, Broward Countyās hospitals have the most COVID patients of any county in the country over the past seven days.
Read the Latest
Anecdotal evidence of the vaccine hesitant coming around ā¦ perhaps a little too late. My new managerās BIL was in Mexico and caught COVID. Somehow he bribed someone and booked a private jet (better than commericial) home to AZ a few days later with a ānegative testā. His wife, my managerās sister, has been totally opposed to the vaccine and when she heard he was flying home, called my manager to ask her which shot she got and went out and got the first dose of Pfizer. Her husband (they are in process of separating) came home and promptly had to be hospitalized, although he is now back home. He has pneumonia and COVID which doesnāt seem coincidental to me. Hopefully that first dose will do her a little bit of good and hopefully they are masking around each other. It just makes me shake my head.
4 Likes
We are being told to plan on a peak in early to mid-October locally.
2 Likes
Right. I want to understand this.
Can somebody tell me what the anti-vaccine arguments are. Because Iām getting slightly cross now.
They say that there are no bad dogs, only bad owners. In so far as the people are dogs and the government are owners, the same might be true.
The reason why any sane, rational, reasonable person would absolutely despise Trump and hold him personally responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths, is that he singularly failed to give national leadership on the most important issue of his presidency.
Forget Fauci ā or anyone else. No-one else has a pulpit like the president. He should have been on TV in prime time giving an absolutely clear, utterly unambiguous message.
Instead you have the literal insanity of a country divided on political lines straight down the middle on a medical issue.
It is just not acceptable to me for someone to say they are āopposed to the vaccineā, let alone ātotallyā. The federal government ā reinforced by the state governments ā should have seen as their number one priority education of the people and taken iron control of this public health catastrophe which is still evolving before our eyes over a year and a half after it started.
So if there is an argument against having a vaccine shot, I want to hear it. And it had better be a damned good argument.
7 Likes
A coworker spoke with me about 2 weeks ago. She has been unvaccinated. She had spoken with a friend who is a healthcare worker as well. She did not understand before how vaccines work. She was concerned about long term side effects and was confused hearing all the negative points of view of the vaccines. She self-admitted that her only hold up at that point was a huge fear of needles. She was telling me she planned to get vaccinated and was working up the nerve. She said her doctorās office called to offer the vaccine and I think she is more willing to go there than anywhere else. It was an interesting conversation to have and I just listened and let her know how my family did with the vaccine. I havenāt seen her since, but I hope she finally worked up the nerve to get it.
I think there are more out there like her. I do think there are people who have been adamant about their freedoms and the vaccine being poison, but I also think there are some confused people out there who donāt know what to think. I hope sending the vaccines to family doctors helps some of those people.
9 Likes
Iāll be frank. There are no good, sound arguments against this vaccine.
But there are rational sounding arguments against them that rely on misinformation or purported studies or stories that have been debunked or disproven or were completely frabricated. People usually have a basis for believing falsehoods, so if they hear about these concerns from someone they trust, they might believe them.
The problem is itās very difficult to disprove a speculative statement. I could say something absurd like, āthe vaccine makes your skin turn purple two years after you get it.ā And no one could disprove that because no one was given the vaccine two years ago. But thereās no reason to believe the vaccine would turn your skin purple. I just made that up. But when people hear an argument like that from a trusted source, it becomes difficult to convince them otherwise.
15 Likes
For real?
Again, for real?
Not trying to be sarcastic. Just wondering if thereās actually a lack of awareness or a disagreement with known positions.
Not sure Iām understanding this properly.
Iāll be explicitly clear. It might get me into trouble.
I think that anyone who doesnāt get vaccinated against COVID is a dangerous moron whose wilful selfishness is responsible for the continued propagation of this vile disease.
The one excuse I will allow them to make is that they genuinely didnāt know any better, like @Alewis678ās coworker.
But I then direct the blame at the 45th President of the United States. He should have made it his personal mission to educate the people. They listen to him.
He wilfully neglected that duty and for that reason alone he should have been impeached and convicted and barred from office for life.
My position on all this is unequivocal and very strongly held. Well, duh.
But I just wanted to makes sure that I wasnāt missing anything. That there was a legitimately good reason why people were very opposed to the vaccine. I donāt know everything.
As for dogs and their owners, the analogy is this: the people are dogs, the government are their owners. If the people behave badly, it is the fault of the government. The job of the president of the United States is to lead. Not to lie in pursuit of enriching themselves and their family personally. Trump did not lead. He lied.
If humanity makes it another 100 years ā and Iām really not sure that it will ā historians of the twenty second century will really struggle to make sense of this period in history. They will just keep asking, āWhat the fuck was wrong with those people?ā
Why wonāt we make it? If we canāt handle COVID, thereās no way we can handle climate change. The examples of its devastating impact are piling up and governments are twiddling their thumbs. Or, you know, passing legislation to make it harder to vote and to ban people from using public bathrooms. You know, the important stuff. Meanwhile, California is on fire and Floridians are catching COVID in wildly disproportionate amounts.
Iāll finish with this:
Thatās Greek people on a ferry escaping the island they live and work on. Itās on fire. This is happening now.
12 Likes
Weāve reached the tipping point on climate change and things scientists were predicting would be happening after 2030 are happening now. If we, the world collectively, had the will to do something then MAYBE we could mitigate some of the worst effects. But we donāt. And we wonāt.
But, this thread isnāt about that so Iāll leave it with this. Iām very glad Iāve never had children. I feel sorry for the future todayās children are going to be stuck with because we were too selfish and stupid and corrupt to do the right thing. Itās really sad.
6 Likes
Thatās a monstrous thing to say and I completely agree with it. Iāve been saying to my friends that, not only am I glad that I donāt have children to worry about, Iām glad that Iām āoldā and getting older. I want to check out before things get really bad.
4 Likes
Side note: Weāve done 1,000 posts in 11 days. This thread is the delta variant of threads.
21 Likes
perfect analogy
3 Likes