The Politics of Covid 19, mask wearing and the vaccination process

[Smoove_B]

Maybe I should have listened in 1997

[Kasey Chang]

The Bolivian situation bears a lot of similarities here in the US... where some politicians, hoping to exploit the government's cautious response to COVID for their own political power, is pushing MMS, something already outlawed in the US, on their constituents, to make the appearance of "we're doing something", since August 2020, before the vaccines became available. And their candidates won the election, and the quackery became law.

And when the vaccine did become available, they are STILL selling the bleach as "detox", and these antivax pro-bleach quacks are making 12000 USD a month, where typical monthly income is under $1000. WTF.

That was months ago. Bolivia is only reporting few hundred cases per day, but overall numbers suggests that less than 30% of country is vaccinated for COVID, and due to remoteness of some regions, it is open season for quacks selling crap like MMS.

[malchior]

Brother murdered his brother, sister-in-law, and another woman. He was apparently known to be very upset at his brother for dispensing vaccines though it hasn't been alleged as being part of his motive for his fratricide as of yet.

Burnham is alleged to have taken his brother's Corvette and stopped at someone's home asking for gas after the killings. He said that the person would see him on TV and that his brother was "killing people with the Covid shot," according to the charging document. That person called state police.

Burnham is charged with one count of murder and a vehicle theft charge in Allegany County, according to online court records.

He faces additional murder charges and other counts in Howard County. The prosecutor's office is going through the indictment process. The Howard County State's Attorney's Office declined to comment Wednesday because the case is ongoing.

[Smoove_B]

It's almost like....mandates work? I need to work on the messaging.

https://twitter.com/bhrenton/status/1446206488276516870

New: @POTUS announces that in just six weeks after a mandate being imposed, the Department of Defense has gone from 67% of active duty forces being vaccinated to 97%.

[Daehawk]

I dont recall where in the bible it states Thou shall not taketh of the vaccine shot.

[Smoove_B]

I'd posted it last week but the Vatican is not allowing vaccine exemptions. The Vatican.

[Isgrimnur]

I'd posted it last week but the Vatican is not allowing vaccine exemptions. The Vatican.

Damned Papists! /s

[Paingod]

It blows my goddamn mind that there are people out there who are so insistent on getting sick and/or dying - or killing their grandparents - that they'd rather be fired from work than get vaccinated.

[Smoove_B]

We see you anti-vaccination chiropractors - and we're not amused.

Participants traveled from around the country to a Wisconsin Dells resort for a sold-out convention that was, in fact, a sea of misinformation and conspiracy theories about vaccines and the pandemic. The featured speaker was the anti-vaccine activist who appeared in the 2020 movie “Plandemic,” which pushed false COVID-19 stories into the mainstream. One session after another discussed bogus claims about the health dangers of mask wearing and vaccines.

The convention was organized by members of a profession that has become a major purveyor of vaccine misinformation during the pandemic: chiropractors.

...

Public health advocates are alarmed by the number of chiropractors who have hitched themselves to the anti-vaccine movement and used their public prominence and sheen of medical expertise to undermine the nation’s response to a COVID-19 pandemic that has killed more than 700,000 Americans.

“People trust them. They trust their authority, but they also feel like they’re a nice alternative to traditional medicine,” said Erica DeWald of Vaccinate Your Family, who tracks figures in the anti-vaccine movement. “Mainstream medicine will refer people out to a chiropractor not knowing that they could be exposed to misinformation. You go because your back hurts, and then suddenly you don’t want to vaccinate your kids.”

[Zaxxon]

That's crazy.

Meanwhile, in my local crazy town... Our new death panel health board voted to allow parents to opt their children out of the district's mask mandate, and out of quarantining.

Because freedom, or something. This is especially rich after the County's railing against government overreach, given that it's exactly that. Hopefully the district can hang on awhile longer.

This is why every week vaccine approval remains missing matters.

[Kasey Chang]

There is enough of chiropractors that are quacks that makes me doubt all of them, and most of them are subject to crank magnetism... they want to peddle something else, so they hitched onto the antivax bandwagon, because their audience are subject to crank magnetism too... if you're okay with one crank, you're vulnerable to more crank claims.

[Kasey Chang]

Latest antivax tactic... claiming vaccines don't prevent COVID... by presenting UK data, not US data.

In the UK, hospitals are showing roughly half vaccinated and half unvaxxed that came in with COVID. Antivaxxers are claiming this proves that vaccines do nothing.

What they fail to realize is UK is 70+% vaccinated, unlike the US at barely over 50%. So if equal number of vaccinated is at the hospital for "breakthru infections" than for the same number of unvaccinated, that means vaccines are working for at least half of the people in preventing COVID altogether. That's lower than expected and somewhat worrying, but hardly the doomsday message antivaxxers are peddling.

[Grifman]

Another denier gets hospitalized, this time a Republican candidate for governor of Texas, Allen West:

https://www.cnn.com/2021/10/09/politics ... index.html

[Zaxxon]

And this is why we can't have nice things.. (thread)

https://twitter.com/AllenWest/status/14 ... Mbd-w&s=19

Because a multi-thousand-dollar reactive treatment worked for homeslice here, we shouldn't require the multi-dollar preventative option.

'Murica, fuck yeah!

[Alefroth]

It's strange that people who don't know what the long term effects of the vaccine are, have no problem shooting up some experimental monoclonal antibodies.

[malchior]

It's strange that people who don't know what the long term effects of the vaccine are, have no problem shooting up some experimental monoclonal antibodies.

Somehow vaccines != medicine. But it isn't all that strange once you just accept that these people are fucking idiots. Trying to figure them out is like chasing the wind.

[Skinypupy]

Allen West is like the ultimate final boss of utter morons.

A true deplorable, through and through.

[Smoove_B]

It's strange that people who don't know what the long term effects of the vaccine are, have no problem shooting up some experimental monoclonal antibodies.

Somehow vaccines != medicine. But it isn't all that strange once you just accept that these people are fucking idiots. Trying to figure them out is like chasing the wind.

It's even worse than that because he's being a vocal champion of monoclonal antibodies while promising to fight 'big pharma" and how they're pushing vaccination. Who does he think is making his Regeneron? Some local dude at a fully organic alpaca farm?

I absolutely believe like DeSantis and Abbott he's making money off this, somehow.

[Smoove_B]

Speaking of disingenuous sacks of crap

https://twitter.com/MeidasTouch/status/ ... 9999965187

Your daily reminder that these are not serious people, but are in fact crisis actors.

For additional context, the 2019 measles outbreak in California was believed to be introduced by people traveling from Thailand and the Philippines. So when non-white people are spreading measles? Vaccinate your kids. Otherwise? We will not comply.

[LordMortis]

Not just vaccinate your kids but the recognition that public health is bigger than personal decision making.

"If not vaccinating your kid only impacting your kid, fine. But that's not the case! Vaccinate your kids or stay home!"

That a strong common sense indictment on personal health choices that affect others in commons, public, and business spaces.

[Smoove_B]

Indeed. So weird how that mentality magically disappeared over the next year. I wonder what changed?

[malchior]

Abbott has decided to join the negligent murderers' bandwagon.

https://twitter.com/kylegriffin1/status ... 1111415809

[Smoove_B]

That's a much bigger deal. Removing all vaccine mandates? Next level. And people don't believe me when I say that nationally public health is in trouble.

[Alefroth]

Next on the chopping block, hand washing mandates in food service establishments.

[Smoove_B]

I can't honestly believe he expects this will actually work. He has to be trying to gain favor for his next political move because there's no way a court will say this is in any way acceptable.

I mean...there's no way a court will say this is in any way acceptable, right?

[Zaxxon]

I mean...there's no way a court will say this is in any way acceptable, right?

[Daehawk]

Abbott has decided to join the negligent murderers' bandwagon.

bah he's been a card carrying evil murdering stupid bastard for many years. Id love to sue him out of everything he owns.

[Smoove_B]

Here's the details:

Gov. Greg Abbott announced Monday that he issued an executive order that bans vaccine mandates "by any entity" in Texas.

The executive order prohibits entities from issuing a mandate to anyone who "objects to such vaccination for any reason of personal conscience, based on a religious belief, or for medical reasons, including prior recovery from COVID-19."

Is it possible he doesn't realize what he's just done? Nah, that can't be it either. But you can't casually prohibit any entity from issuing a vaccine mandate (like a school mandating an MMR shot) and then in your follow up guidance specifically name COVID-19 as a valid reason to object - like that's the only thing you're actually out to stop.

[malchior]

The mental math here is astounding. A ban by fiat of what are probably legal obligations is somehow not tyranny.

[Daehawk]

GOP probably heavily invested in hospitals.

[Kasey Chang]

GOP probably heavily invested in hospitals.

And mortuaries.

[raydude]

GOP probably heavily invested in hospitals.

If so that's a losing investment, especially in states with high Covid. COVID patients are among the least profitable patients.

[Ralph-Wiggum]

Well, Federal law trumps state law, right? So this *should* be overturned if challenged in court.

*but it's Texas, so who knows

[LordMortis]

Well, Federal law trumps state law, right? So this *should* be overturned if challenged in court.

*but it's Texas, so who knows

For Interstate business it should. That's what I don't grok. Do all these non localized businesses pick up and leave? Do interstate businesses not centered in Texas quit doing business in Texas?

[Smoove_B]

In other news (this is the first I'm seeing it), parents in Wisconsin are suing school after their kids caught COVID:

Just weeks into the new school year, both boys tested positive for the coronavirus. Lawsuits filed this month in two Wisconsin federal courts blame what they describe as the schools’ lax policies on masks, quarantining and contact tracing.

Both the boards of education for the School District of Waukesha and the School District of Fall Creek had voted to end many of the coronavirus mitigation policies that had been in place last year, according to the two lawsuits. That included getting rid of universal mask requirements.

I genuinely hope they win.

[Unagi]

In other news (this is the first I'm seeing it), parents in Wisconsin are suing school after their kids caught COVID:

Just weeks into the new school year, both boys tested positive for the coronavirus. Lawsuits filed this month in two Wisconsin federal courts blame what they describe as the schools’ lax policies on masks, quarantining and contact tracing.

Both the boards of education for the School District of Waukesha and the School District of Fall Creek had voted to end many of the coronavirus mitigation policies that had been in place last year, according to the two lawsuits. That included getting rid of universal mask requirements.

I genuinely hope they win.

+1

[Unagi]

Well, Federal law trumps state law, right? So this *should* be overturned if challenged in court.

*but it's Texas, so who knows

For Interstate business it should. That's what I don't grok. Do all these non localized businesses pick up and leave? Do interstate businesses not centered in Texas quit doing business in Texas?

I'm scratching my head as to how this will work out too. Suddenly do all the national chains accept the risks in Texas and stay there (without their mandates) or do they actually leave Texas (which I cannot imagine).

[Remus West]

Well, Federal law trumps state law, right? So this *should* be overturned if challenged in court.

*but it's Texas, so who knows

For Interstate business it should. That's what I don't grok. Do all these non localized businesses pick up and leave? Do interstate businesses not centered in Texas quit doing business in Texas?

I'm scratching my head as to how this will work out too. Suddenly do all the national chains accept the risks in Texas and stay there (without their mandates) or do they actually leave Texas (which I cannot imagine).

How awesome would it be if all of the national chains centered there looked at that as the final straw and simply said "we are out of here" picked up stakes and moved to a very blue state.

[Smoove_B]

But it's not just COVID. He repealed *all* vaccination mandates, so kids in schools? No more vaccines are required. Even outside of the COVID pandemic, that's insanity. Childhood vaccinations are down nationwide, especially for teens that need MMR and DTaP boosters. Business mandates are one thing, but saying they're no longer a requirement for kids in schools? It really is like he's trying to encourage pain and suffering.

[Blackhawk]

But it's not just COVID. He repealed *all* vaccination mandates, so kids in schools? No more vaccines are required.

Fuuuuck...

I just skimmed past the headline earlier, assumed it was COVID, rolled my eyes, and moved on.

We have genuinely mentally ill, dangerous people in country in this office, and 40% of the nation is cheering them on because it makes another group squirm. It is really hard to not take on an aggressive, violent, Drazzilian demeanor in the face of people acting with slow, deadly violence against us.