Chuck Wendig on the Great Surrender. That’s how I’m feeling many days.
I feel like there’s an excluded middle here. What about the places that are trying to keep in-school classes and not doing lockdowns but are enforcing masking and requiring vaccinations to eat in restaurants, go to the gym, attend the theater, etc.? I can tell you that Chicago or Cook County aren’t saying
When his take on a children’s hospital saying the benefits of in-school education outweigh the risks in light of Omicron is to seemingly lump them in with the deniers, I feel like the worst stereotypes by the deniers of people who take Covid seriously are being embodied: restrictions for the sake of restrictions, and only the strictest of restrictions will do. If it doesn’t hurt, it ain’t working. And considering costs and benefits to any degree – to concede that lockdowns and closures even have costs and aren’t an unalloyed good – is the same as denialism.
Not just financial costs, as many of the comments to the blog post discount it. Social costs, emotional costs, even basic physical costs. When Covid was at its worst, when vaccines were still only a gleam in people’s eyes, health experts were telling people not to put off medical care. But it seems like if you acknowledge that there are worse things than Covid, the blogger is counting you among the people surrendering.
I’m a firm believer in keeping things open with indoor masking and proof of vaccination and boosters required and enforced. Expecting people to take reasonable precautions is eminently sensible, and the “you can’t make me” people can go lump it. And if you (generic you) don’t feel comfortable going to a restaurant or the theater even when vaccinated, boosted, and masked, that’s entirely your business. Conversely, however, I don’t believe that demanding another indefinite period of closures or we’re all surrendering to Covid is sensible.
Over the wknd I spoke w/ a nephew employed at an engineering firm in SW Mich. He said they have 2 main competitors. Nephew’s employer is mandating vax and masks. He said they are experiencing staffing difficulties, b/c workers are leaving and being hired by the 2 competitors who DO NOT require vax/masks.
I asked him if employees would take a pay cut to either work in a vaxxed/masked environment, or to not have to vax/mask. He was unsure that there was a sigif difference in pay/bens at the 3 employers. Just that it was a competitive labor market, and a significant percentage of their workforce preferred no mask/vax.
Crazy! And with an attitude like that, this thing will never go away.
Right now Chicago Public Schools are facing difficulties. Strife w/ the union. But I was shocked when I saw the percentages of students who were unvaxxed. Again - just crazy! I never really saw the problem back in the 60s when they just lined us all up in the front of the classroom and jabbed us all.
Los Angeles is generally keeping things open but with masks and vaccine requirements. Yet despite these reasonable public health measures (and decent compliance), the graph of our hospitalizations–not just the positive tests-- looks like a backwards capital L:
http://publichealth.lacounty.gov/media/coronavirus/data/
A good take from the Atlantic:
A virus that seems both pervasive and mild offers an opening to people who are, let’s call them, “vaxxed and done.” The attitude of the VADs is this:
For more than a year, I did everything that public-health authorities told me to do. I wore masks. I canceled vacations. I made sacrifices. I got vaccinated. I got boosted. I’m happy to get boosted again. But this virus doesn’t stop. Year over year, the infections don’t decrease. Instead, virulence for people like me is decreasing, either because the virus is changing, or because of growing population immunity, or both. Americans should stop pointlessly guilting themselves about all these cases. In the past week, [daily confirmed COVID cases per capita] were higher than the U.S. in Ireland, Greece, Iceland, Denmark, France, the U.K., Spain, Portugal, Italy, Switzerland, and even Australia, one of the most COVID-cautious countries in the world. As the coronavirus continues its unstoppable march toward endemicity, our attitude toward the virus should follow a similar path toward stoicism. COVID is becoming something like the seasonal flu for most people who keep up with their shots, so I’m prepared to treat this like I’ve treated the flu: by basically not worrying about it and living my life normally.
[…]
But there is an opposing group. Let’s call them the “vaxxed and cautious.” Here’s my best summary of their perspective:
Why on earth would we suddenly relax measures now, during the largest statistical wave of COVID ever recorded in the U.S.? We shouldn’t treat Omicron like any old seasonal flu, because it’s not like any old seasonal flu. It’s likely deadlier for those without immunity and almost certainly several times more transmissible for everybody else. We have no idea what the effects of Omicron on long COVID will be, but evidence of lingering symptoms should make us wary of just letting tens of millions of people get needlessly infected. Moreover, the health-care system is already worn down and at risk of being overloaded. Record-high caseloads are societally debilitating, creating long chains of infections that are bound to reach some immunocompromised people and the elderly, thus causing needless death. For all these reasons, we should take individual measures to throttle the spread of this virus.
That’s me.
However, in many cases, hospitalization reflects mainly a positive test. Atlantic article on patients hospitalized with Covid vs. for Covid. NBC article.
Knowing what we know now, was there ever any chance of beating it? About the best that we can do is to minimize the number of cases.
One problem is that it is a zoonosis – it readily crosses over between human and animals. There have been reports about it in a number of different species including, dogs, deer, mink, and the snow leopard. I’m sure that list isn’t inclusive. If we want to have a chance of eradicating a disease, it had pretty much be specific to one species and covid isn’t that.
The best we could hope for is a very good vaccine to keep it in check. Early on, it was recognized that the immunity from having one of the four coronavirus colds was good for maybe a year and there was no reason to expect this to be different. I pooh-poohed the idea of a vaccine for quite a while but finally accepted the idea that it might help a lot. As it turns out, it does seem to help limit the severity of the disease which is certainly a good thing.
Of course, a vaccine doesn’t have to be perfect. Vaccines for some diseases will generally protect us for the rest of our lives and some for just a few years or less. For example, we should get a booster for tetanus every few years, but most don’t. My last tetanus booster was about six or seven years ago.
And people have to get the vaccines. Last year, in the US one man died from rabies after refusing the vaccine because he didn’t like vaccines. I guess he showed everyone. Two others thought that the bat didn’t penetrate the skin so they declined the vaccines. If there is any question at all about it, you should get the vaccine. It is surprising that there are people who refuse it.
Even though I do not think that we have ever had a chance with beating covid, it was still worth trying.
Interesting; that makes me feel a little more hopeful.
So–testing my comfort level. I just got a call that there’s an open spot in a heli-ski trip that a bunch of old friends are doing (that I haven’t seen in 3 years because of Covid). I’d need to get there (Northern BC) Saturday. The situation: fully vaxxed and boosted; I’d drive myself; travel covid test for all 48 hrs prior; rapid test for all before getting to the lodge; 20 guests from all over the US; all staff live on site; all staff tested weekly; only exposure on the way up would be a hotel room in Jasper AB; probably a 60% discount.
Would you do it?
My daughter and SIL traveled to Virginia this past weekend to prepare for crazy times at the hospital where they work.
Today is the deadline for vaccination. Either you’ve been vaccinated or you’re fired. The hospital administration had been told if there wasn’t 100% vaccine compliance, then they were quitting.
Shit is hitting the fan.
Just wondering if you can clarify this, are you saying that the administrators will resign if they fail to get 100% of staff vaccinated?
If so, that seems a little rash. Is any (large) organisation likely to see 100% compliance? Talk about being a hostage to fortune.
I’m so sick of this whole situation. I’m not too worried for myself, but I’m getting more and more concerned for my grandkids every damn day.
It’s just exhausting to be so worried all the time. sigh
No, sorry, I worded that badly. A group of vaccinated doctors and nurses do not want to work with doctors and nurses who are unvaccinated. The number of people in this group (provaxx) is greater than the number of antivaxxers.
This led to administration giving the ultimatum to the antivaxxers.
Ah, that makes sense. Knowing how “popular” administrators tend to be in general I was wondering how much of a “threat” their resignation commitment would be. 
“If you don’t get vaccinated, one of you bastards will have to step up and deal with the insurance companies if you want to get paid!”
That’d scare the shit out of me!
Yes, in a heartbeat. Vaxxed and boosted people need to return to the normal lives as much as possible, assuming they’re not in a high risk group.
Are you crossing an international border? That would be my hang-up. While Canada isn’t the worst place to be stuck when ill, I would still be a bit nervous about the possibility. But if you’re driving, presumably you wouldn’t need to test to get back home?
good point, I’ve heard enough scare stories to know that’s a shit-sandwich that no-one wants.
I would, but then I’m so desperate to get skiing again at this point I’d probably be willing to sell a kidney, I can get by with three anyway.
They’re going to test every morning at the lodge. We’ll see if I can get a travel test in the morning… 40% off the going rate since it’s last minute. The best heli-skiing is discount heli-skiing!