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

[ImLawBoy]

I'm not sure I'm bothered by the idea of briefly identifying yourself before entering a business, especially those that have to buzz people in.

What about religious face coverings?

[Blackhawk]

I'm not sure I'm bothered by the idea of briefly identifying yourself before entering a business, especially those that have to buzz people in.

What about religious face coverings?

There are already multiple situations in which a person wearing a religious face covering is required to remove it for identification (such as passing through an airport.) I'm not talking about the idea of "can then allow people to put masks back on " (which was more of an interpretation) and just about the idea of confirming your ID/looking at the doorbell to be buzzed in. The only issue is the respect that is shown in requesting it.

[GreenGoo]

There are already multiple situations in which a person wearing a religious face covering is required to remove it for identification (such as passing through an airport.) I'm not talking about the idea of "can then allow people to put masks back on " (which was more of an interpretation) and just about the idea of confirming your ID/looking at the doorbell to be buzzed in. The only issue is the respect that is shown in requesting it.

Presumably most if not all of those are for government required identification.

Letting/supporting/suggesting the local Karen demand everyone show their faces is a recipe for a lot of strife. Maybe even police involved strife.

That said, I'm not opposed, as religious beliefs shouldn't be a get out of whatever is required of everyone else free card.

Oddly, this is not a new right. A business can refuse service to almost anyone not in a protected group, and can even refuse those if the reason can be shown to be unrelated to the group's protected status.

[Blackhawk]

I have no problem with it in anyplace with a buzzer/camera system for security to keep random people from wandering in. I could also see places like casinos asking people to remove it long enough to glance at the camera. Nevada casinos have never (pre-pandemic) allowed masks or even face paint - it's too easy for known cheats to sit down and steal money (and the surveillance department has mugshots of each and every one, and knows them well enough to catch them most of the time as soon as they sit down at a table.) To be fair, even at the time hijabs were a very delicate thing - unless the person in question was doing something specific that required checking her against the book, it was quietly ignored, despite being in violation. And if it was necessary, we had a woman, preferably a Muslim, make the request in private (although within sight of a camera.)

But it isn't like grocery stores are going to pay someone to stand at the door to ask everyone to expose their face for three seconds before coming in.

[Smoove_B]

I'll note here that it's the *police* saying people should take off masks, not individual business or organizations representing businesses in NYC.

[LordMortis]

I'll note here that it's the *police* saying people should take off masks, not individual business or organizations representing businesses in NYC.

But they will allow businesses to allow people to put them back on.

[Unagi]

gracious.

[Blackhawk]

I'll note here that it's the *police* saying people should take off masks, not individual business or organizations representing businesses in NYC.

I read it differently, although I'm thinking that it's because it's a shitty article that doesn't give the source, and most of the 'big news' in there is either paraphrased or interpretation.

Removing a mask and allowing identification can be a “condition of entry,” NYPD Chief of Department Jeffrey Maddrey said. Businesses can then allow people to put masks back on after they’ve shown their face.

I read that as saying that business should be allowed to require that people show their faces to gain entry, not that they be forced to. But searching around, practically every article contains the exact same text, most linking back to that article. I'm trying to figure out where the newspaper got the "Police want NYC businesses to require customers show their faces " from.

[Blackhawk]

Another article had this quote as well:

“People when they come in should show their face, they should identify themselves,” Maddrey said at a press conference. “If they feel like they want to put their mask back on after they identify themselves, for their safety, they should do so.”

Which sounds a little closer to the original headline, but still lacks any context. I'd rather just see video of the conference.

Sorry, I'm a little distrustful of media spin these days when a press conference is condensed to a tiny, out-of-context quote.

[Smoove_B]

Bottom of the article:

“We need our businesses to be proactive and do their due diligence,” Maddrey said. “We need to make sure people are identifying themselves.”

He (police chief) is saying businesses in NYC aren't asking people to remove masks and implying that there's a crime issue in NYC as a result.

[LordMortis]

I also would tend to give the awkward wording the benefit of the doubt but it slips away with

“We need our businesses to be proactive and do their due diligence,” Maddrey said. “We need to make sure people are identifying themselves.”

Edit: BAM'd

[Smoove_B]

Just need confirmation Mayor Adams met with police leadership and told them to push the message and I can call it a day.

To be clear, I'm totally speculating on this, but Adams is...a character.

[Blackhawk]

FWIW, doing their due diligence isn't the same as requiring every business to unmask every customer, it just means that if they're going to lock their doors, they need to be responsible for identifying those that they let in, and it ties in with the idea that he's wanting to make it acceptable for business to demand it. Now, I'm not saying that the police aren't saying that it should be mandatory - they may be - I'm just saying that the vague, paraphrased articles with short quotes don't really make their case to me, leading me to wonder if they're 'tweaking' their headlines to draw views (which is the rule rather than the exception these days.)

The context of this was an attack recently that involved someone with a mask posing as an Amazon delivery driver to gain access to a jewelry store, at which point the elderly employee (owner?) was beaten and robbed.

Of course, that doesn't really justify the conclusions regardless of interpretation. Was this woman supposed to ID her Amazon delivery driver by seeing his face? Amazon has hundreds of thousands of drivers. No mask wouldn't have made a difference. I'd guess that the police are more annoyed at the $1.1 million robbery suspect not showing his face to the cameras than they are that she let the driver in without running facial recognition on him. It makes them look bad.

[Max Peck]

Do masks work? It’s a question of physics, biology, and behavior

On March 28, 2020, as COVID-19 cases began to shut down public life in much of the United States, then-Surgeon General Jerome Adams issued an advisory on Twitter: The general public should not wear masks. “There is scant or conflicting evidence they benefit individual wearers in a meaningful way,” he wrote.

Adams’ advice was in line with messages from other US officials and the World Health Organization. Days later, though, US public health leaders shifted course. Mask-wearing was soon a pandemic-control strategy worldwide, but whether this strategy succeeded is now a matter of heated debate—particularly after a major new analysis, released in January, seemed to conclude that masks remain an unproven strategy for curbing transmission of COVID-19 and other respiratory viruses.

“There’s still no evidence that masks are effective during a pandemic,” the study’s lead author, physician, and epidemiologist Tom Jefferson, recently told an interviewer.

Many public health experts vigorously disagree with that claim, but the study has caught attention, in part, because of its pedigree: It was published by Cochrane, a not-for-profit that aims to bring rigorous scientific evidence more squarely into the practice of medicine. The group’s highly regarded systematic reviews affect clinical practice worldwide. “It’s really our gold standard for evidence-based medicine,” said Jeanne Noble, a physician and associate professor of emergency medicine at the University of California, San Francisco. One epidemiologist described Cochrane as “the Bible.”

[Smoove_B]

Just need confirmation Mayor Adams met with police leadership and told them to push the message and I can call it a day.

It's almost like I have a crystal ball:

Mayor Adams called on shoppers Monday to enter New York City businesses maskless from now on — a message aimed at reducing shoplifting, but one that runs counter to COVID-era prescriptions to mask up when in enclosed, public spaces.

Adams, who was speaking on “PIX11 Morning News,” didn’t entirely rule out masks in stores, noting that shoppers could don face coverings moments after entering — as long as their face could be fully viewed before putting it on when first entering a store.

“Let’s be clear. Some of these characters going into stores that are wearing a mask, they’re not doing it because they are afraid of the pandemic,” he said. “They’re doing it because they’re afraid of the police, and we need to stop allowing them to exploit the safety of the pandemic by wearing masks, committing crimes.”

To further clarify:

Adams said Monday that the city is now calling on shop owners to forbid patrons into their stores if they have a mask on, but he did not say exactly how they should go about doing that, or what they should do in the event of inevitable confrontations.

I'm old enough to remember when we were told store owners couldn't force people to wear masks. Now they need to force them not to wear masks.

Adams did note, though, that forcing shoppers to remove masks in stores is aimed at captured their likeness on film in the event of a crime taking place.

“We are putting out a clear call to all of our shops, do not allow people to enter the store without taking off their face mask,” Adams said minutes earlier on 1010 WINS. “Once they’re inside, they can continue to wear it if they so desire to do so, but we need to use the technology we have available to identify those shoplifters and those who are committing serious crimes.”

Still waiting for information that NYC is overrun with crime because of people masking.

[Blackhawk]

So they're making people who wear masks look like criminals who will then be targeted as such, and it all likely comes down to crime statistics that make the city look bad (the police are having trouble IDing people.)

It's not a good time to be a person who would have needed to wear a mask regardless of COVID.

[LawBeefaroni]

Love the subtle messaging:

“Let’s be clear. Some of these characters going into stores that are wearing a mask, they’re not doing it because they are afraid of the pandemic."

Ergo, people wearing masks who aren't criminals trying to hide their identities are people who are afraid of the pandemic.

Are you afraid? Wuss!

[Smoove_B]

Seems like a great person then to bring into the fold

https://twitter.com/AndrewGiambrone/sta ... 8041045002

NYC Mayor Eric Adams is part of a new national advisory board being built by President Biden’s team who “will travel and speak on Biden’s behalf during his expected reelection campaign,” the WaPo reports

[malchior]

This totally won't backfire. It's almost like the Biden administration creates strategy in a lab designed to alienate key voting demographics.

[Smoove_B]

Is it the death of the 4th wall? Is it COVID-19 politics? Maybe a little of both...

https://twitter.com/biblioracle/status/ ... 1799910400

Hey there, @nytimes and @nytopinion, these two pieces published under your masthead are fundamentally at odds. Which of them is true, and will you correct the record for the one that is not true? Hint: The one on the left.

Of note:

It's important to recognize that this is not a matter of competing opinions. Stephens rests his entire case on the study that Tufekci reports was fundamentally mischaracterized by the study's own authors. Stephens' column rests on literal misinformation.

[malchior]

Bret Stephens getting called out on his intellectual dishonesty!? Shocking! Maybe he'll stir up some fake controversy about bed bugs again.

[LordMortis]

Seems to me that masks work and mask mandates after the initial compliance went poof did little because they had no teeth once people stopped complying.

[Smoove_B]

Missed this last week in Wisconsin:

Wisconsin Republicans blocked Gov. Tony Evers’ plan Thursday to require student vaccinations against meningitis and tighten student chickenpox vaccination requirements.

The Legislature’s GOP-controlled rules committee voted 6-4 to block the proposal. All six of the panel’s Republican members voted to stop the policy. The vote comes two days after a lengthy public hearing on the policy changes that saw parents complain that the new requirements trample their liberties. The committee blocked the proposal last legislative session as well.

“(The committee), once again, met its oversight duty relating to the improper actions taken by DHS to enact binding administrative code provisions that were arbitrary and capricious, as well as, placing undue hardships on the families of this state,” Sen. Steve Nass, a committee co-chairperson, said in a statement. He said the committee action “restores the reasonable right of parents to make immunization decisions for their children.”

To be clear then, it's not related to COVID-19 directly, but it's been influenced by COVID-19. Here in my state we were set to tighten childhood immunization regulations - a battle that had been ongoing for 4+ years in the legislature at the time. A vote was finally called in January of 2020 and despite having control of not only the Governorship and the state legislature, Democrats failed to pass the measure. I'm having a hard time imagining it'll ever pass now.

But really this is the take home message:

Republicans would have none of it. Nass said he doesn’t trust anything Westergaard [the state epidemiologist] says after he recommended the state shutdown during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.

[malchior]

That is another disturbing aspect of the radicalization. They are actively retconning the pandemic. Well beyond what they did before in this arena.It's entirely built around avoiding accountability for their own policy errors. In the end they'll get away with it because segments of the American public are ... just broken.

[Smoove_B]

Not really politics, but I'm beginning to think the virus changes the way people think:

Swinton expressed her delight that the audience was largely not wearing masks, apparently, and volunteered the information, "I'm just about to start shooting a picture in Ireland, and I was told . . . to wear a mask at all times, and I'm not."

...

But her most damning statements came next. "I'm not wearing a mask," Swinton said, "because I'm super healthy and I've had COVID so many times. And I'm so full of antibodies and I have faith."

What struck me is how this contrasts with her interview from last year:

Only one year ago, Swinton spoke candidly with W Magazine about her struggles with long COVID, the lingering and often worsening symptoms triggered by a COVID infection which continue to impact an estimated 1 out of every 5 COVID cases. Yes, COVID is still out there and yes, it's still terrible. When W Magazine interviewed Swinton in 2022, she was "still in recovery" six months after her symptoms started, "when she was unable to get out of bed for three weeks." She described coughing, intense vertigo and brain fog. "The actor is still having issues with her memory," W Magazine wrote.

If only there was some Marvel character animated gif I could use here to make a point about masking. I'm sure it'll come to me.

[Blackhawk]

Not really politics, but I'm beginning to think the virus changes the way people think:

At this point, I'm seeing more and more that makes me think it has become less about politics and more about psychology. People (most people) were terrified, then just plain 'afraid', stressed, angry, and on edge for years. This has been a battleground for many, and a painful forced lifestyle change that had a huge impact on peoples' livelihoods, culture, and minds. It was something that had people fearing for their lives, something that had people not trusting each other, something that was filled with wildly contradictory information, and something that drew extreme hostility from others. Even for those of us who had good information (thanks, Smoove), it has been exhausting. And it's been that way for years.

And that's just for the people who didn't lose someone to it.

And I think we're seeing people treating like other long-term traumas. In some cases, that means burying the worst of it, in others it means clinging to a less desirable (from an intellectual rather than emotional standpoint) alternative.

[Max Peck]

Not really politics, but I'm beginning to think the virus changes the way people think:

Swinton expressed her delight that the audience was largely not wearing masks, apparently, and volunteered the information, "I'm just about to start shooting a picture in Ireland, and I was told . . . to wear a mask at all times, and I'm not."

...

But her most damning statements came next. "I'm not wearing a mask," Swinton said, "because I'm super healthy and I've had COVID so many times. And I'm so full of antibodies and I have faith."

What struck me is how this contrasts with her interview from last year:

Only one year ago, Swinton spoke candidly with W Magazine about her struggles with long COVID, the lingering and often worsening symptoms triggered by a COVID infection which continue to impact an estimated 1 out of every 5 COVID cases. Yes, COVID is still out there and yes, it's still terrible. When W Magazine interviewed Swinton in 2022, she was "still in recovery" six months after her symptoms started, "when she was unable to get out of bed for three weeks." She described coughing, intense vertigo and brain fog. "The actor is still having issues with her memory," W Magazine wrote.

If only there was some Marvel character animated gif I could use here to make a point about masking. I'm sure it'll come to me.

Survival bias plus damaged memory is apparently a helluva drug.

[gilraen]

It's like these people are in severe denial, for lack of a better term. Humans are not designed to live in a permanent state of fight-or-flight, and since the individuals feel like they have no control over what happens to them in this new COVID era, they choose (first subconsiously, then consciously) to pretend that the danger has passed and they can go back to their normal lives. After all, they may have initially did everything right (wore masks, got vaccinated) and still got sick. So their next logical conclusion is that if the outcome is the same regardless of what they do, then why bother?

[YellowKing]

I'm not sure how much blame you can put on the average layman for feeling things are back to normal when there are no more mask mandates, no more COVID briefings from the governor, no more COVID articles in the news, hospitals are back to relatively normal levels, the healthcare community is telling us we're now endemic and not pandemic. etc.

I don't think that's denial, I think that's just reacting to what the world is telling them with no reason to believe otherwise.

[GreenGoo]

Chicken and egg situation. Politicians feel like they need to do "something" to re-establish normalcy, particularly when constituents are agitating and internet/fox are spreading disinformation, so they pretend everything is normal, and now laypeople can appeal to authority that they were right all along, and it isn't a big deal. QED.

[hepcat]

That walking pile of putrid slime, Rand Paul (did I even need to clarify who I was taking about there?), was trying to bring his Covid conspiracy crap to a Homeland Security markup. But he was met with the hilarious antics of Senator Gary Peters.

Paul then offered another amendment to broadly block any National Institutes of Health funding from going to China to fund “gain of function” research on coronaviruses at labs in Wuhan and other facilities.

The Kentucky senator has previously pointed to an Oct. 20, 2021, letter to members of Congress in which he says the National Institutes of Health admitted that research it supported was used to create more potent viruses in Wuhan.

Peters quickly offered a second-degree amendment that changed the language to prohibit any money in the Fire Grants and Safety Act “from being provided to a Chinese fire department.”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Paul complained.

[Kurth]

I was traveling for work last week, sitting in the terminal at PDX noting a bunch of people coughing and sneezing. It made me start thinking that, given my family is heading out on a long-awaited cruise for spring break next week and are six months or so out from our last COVID booster, we should probably bite the bullet and get another booster today. I wasn't excited about the notion since every time I get the shot, I feel like death warmed over for a day and a half, but heading out on a ship with 4K others of various vaccination and COVID-denialism status, seemed like a good idea.

But when we showed up for the shot today, we were told we were not eligible because we already had a bivalent booster. Apparently, once you get that, you are officially done. No more boosters for you, despite the fact that efficacy apparently drops once you're 3-6 months out from the last shot.

The pharmacist sympathized and noted that it's a CDC-thing. She said she's turning away a lot of people seeking additional boosters now that we're 6+ months out from the release of the bivalent booster, but she said there's nothing she or anyone else can do until the CDC updates guidance.

Does this make any sense?

[Smoove_B]

Does this make any sense?

No. I was talking about it somewhere around here. Probably the other side of the fence in the Covid-19 vaccination updates. Basically the idea is that the vaccines are working as intended - keeping people out of hospitals and from dying - mostly. Elders are still high risk, but vaccinated elders fare better.

The talk is there might be another round of shots offered in the Fall of 2023, but nothing official. If you want to read the meeting highlights, go here.

Basically - you're on your own. Hope you're not part of the population that suffers from chronic illness during your next exposure.

If the link is too much, here's the summary:

CDC further clarified the goal of the vaccine program: Prevention of severe disease.

Because of this, ACIP decided there was “insufficient evidence” to suggest older adults need another bivalent dose at this time. They did say this could change in the future based on three things:

Hospitalization rates among those who got the bivalent start to increase

Other signals of waning vaccine effectiveness of bivalent vaccines

SARS-CoV-2 significantly mutates

They did a similar evaluation for immunocompromised. And came to the same conclusion.

So, as of now, everyone will be eligible for one shot a year. We will need to be flexible, as this may change. Is this the right call? Time will tell.

[Kurth]

Does this make any sense?

No. I was talking about it somewhere around here. Probably the other side of the fence in the Covid-19 vaccination updates. Basically the idea is that the vaccines are working as intended - keeping people out of hospitals and from dying - mostly. Elders are still high risk, but vaccinated elders fare better.

The talk is there might be another round of shots offered in the Fall of 2023, but nothing official. If you want to read the meeting highlights, go here.

Basically - you're on your own. Hope you're not part of the population that suffers from chronic illness during your next exposure.

If the link is too much, here's the summary:

CDC further clarified the goal of the vaccine program: Prevention of severe disease.

Because of this, ACIP decided there was “insufficient evidence” to suggest older adults need another bivalent dose at this time. They did say this could change in the future based on three things:

Hospitalization rates among those who got the bivalent start to increase

Other signals of waning vaccine effectiveness of bivalent vaccines

SARS-CoV-2 significantly mutates

They did a similar evaluation for immunocompromised. And came to the same conclusion.

So, as of now, everyone will be eligible for one shot a year. We will need to be flexible, as this may change. Is this the right call? Time will tell.

What I don't really understand is, what's the downside? It's not like giving people the option to get another booster now is going to do any harm, is it? Why the reluctance?

[Smoove_B]

What I don't really understand is, what's the downside? It's not like giving people the option to get another booster now is going to do any harm, is it? Why the reluctance?

It's not the downside as much as it is there is no benefit, aka you're (statistically) unlikely to die if you've received the bivalent booster. That's all that matters now - keeping you from death. There's no evidence to suggest another shot 6+ months after the bivalent shot offers any type of additional protection against death, so they're rolling the dice to see what happens this spring and summer and then making a call to see if it's worth it to offer another bivalent shot (presumably) at 12+ months.

If they're right nothing changes between now and the Fall / Winter 2023 and levels of COVID-19 stay at some new level. If they're wrong, another wave rips through the population impacting people that haven't had a vaccination for 6+ months and/or prior illness in the last 2+ months and we'll see what that looks like.

[Blackhawk]

If there is no harm and no benefit, why not just allow it to those who are willing to pay? I get not promoting it, but forbidding people from getting it seems odd.

[Smoove_B]

Probably a question of the legal issues surrounding approval and use. Without scientific evidence to support the benefit of receiving the additional vaccinations (or offering them) it could open up (I guess?) claims of negligence if something goes awry.

As someone that received the bivalent shot back in September of 2022, I totally get the frustration.

[Kraken]

I saw a concert this weekend for the first time in forever. A few weeks before the show, the theater changed its policy from "masks required" to "masks recommended." Going in, the crowd was maybe 50% masked. Coming out, that was less than 10%. And this audience skewed old.

I spent most of February sick with not-covid/not-flu. It was the sickest I've been in recorded memory and for a couple of days I wished I would just die and get it over with. So I'd really rather not get sick again, but I don't want to never do anything again, either. If a mask might give me +1 to my saving throw, I'm willing to be the only guy wearing one.

[Blackhawk]

I honestly don't think I've seen a single mask since last year. I don't mean not many, I mean zero.

[Kurth]

If there is no harm and no benefit, why not just allow it to those who are willing to pay? I get not promoting it, but forbidding people from getting it seems odd.

Yeah, my point exactly. It's not like we're talking about school/business closures or indoor dining bans or social distancing or masking. The fact that there might not be a benefit to an additional bivalent booster seems like a really, really poor reason to prohibit people from getting it.

Especially when the potential benefit - less severe COVID cases and possibly less death - is so significant.

It just seems again that we are fundamentally unable to perform rational cost/benefit analysis.