Victoria Raverna wrote: Sun Dec 12, 2021 9:51 pm
No prevention like mask and social distancing?
The masking is a HUGE omission. I think we've lost the narrative on social distancing so the best we can do is promote ventilation for family gatherings - but to still try and keep them small. More people, more risk.
Isgrimnur wrote: Sun Dec 12, 2021 10:21 pm
He sure as shit is doing better than the last guy who's son-in-law advocated for not doing anything because it was only people in blue cities who were dying from it.
I am still trying to imagine what a current Trump presidency would look like and I think it would have most likely just made the various state-level differences much, much greater. It's hard to say what states might have done to protect workers (like vaccination and mask mandates) vs what's happening now.
I'm trying to not get cynical and believe that this is all about the economy - top to bottom - with all decisions focused on keeping everything going. Regardless of motivations, the message from the top (i.e. Zients and the CDC) has clearly been vaccination is everything - get vaccinated. It should have been pretty clear back in May that was going to be a problem (when vaccination stalled), but here we are ~7 months later and the vaccination only strategy hasn't worked. In fact, it hasn't worked to the degree that anti-vaccination people are using our current situation to point out how vaccinations are useless because COVID-19 is still ripping through America and the rest of the world despite the ~60% of Americans that are vaccinated. Don't try to argue with them or convince them otherwise - clearly the vaccines aren't working.
What's crazy is that even if we somehow magically vaccinated 80% of the people, we'd still likely need to be masking because of what the early data on Omicron is suggesting - especially if that 80% isn't people with 3 doses.
Anyway, things are definitely better but I am genuinely at a loss to understand just WTF is happening at a federal level right now with the current plan. And unofficially I've been hearing from various people that Zients is pushing vaccination to all the state governors as the policy to follow - not to worry about masking or to push masking, likely because of how it will ultimately be weaponized for elections and political purposes.
Even for my own state - there's no reason we shouldn't have a mask mandate. We can't even get a restaurant/dining/venue pass system going, like NYC. All while our cases, hospitalizations and deaths continue to crank up.
I saw something on Twitter earlier today that sums it all up. 1/3 of the population are COVID-19 deniers - nothing will change them. 1/3 of the population vaccinated but then removed their masks and went back to doing everything they were doing before the pandemic, some of whom are now continuing to spread the virus and suffer re-infection. The final 1/3 are vaccinated, masking and limiting contact, but that 1/3 isn't enough to protect the other 2/3s of the country.
