Coronavirus

Shellhead wrote: Some of the patients have the Lambda variant that may have originated in Peru.

The world is about 30% 1-shot vaccinated at the moment. This is going to be situation-normal for an extended period of time.

I just saw that poorer countries are 1% vaccinated.

Many people in these countries don’t have the ability to not work or remote work, they either work or starve. And they don’t have access to proper healthcare and sanitation, good information that they can understand, support from their governments…

www.thebulwark.com/covid-compassion-fatigue/

"Compassion fatigue" is a useful and accurate phrase.

hotseatgames wrote:

Sagrilarus wrote: I don't think this is a fair assessment.

It's based on the potential for mutations to slide past the vaccination, the chances of which would be greatly minimized if we had a higher vaccinated population. I don't want to get this fucking virus, even a mild case. It is diabolical in its randomness. Would I be one who shrugs it off, or would I be one who gets decimated? I don't want to find out, and every motherfucking GQP out there is increasing my changes of having to roll the dice.

This is the biggest issue we face right now. The mixing of vaccinated and unvaccinated populations while it is still running rampant has the greatest potential for a variant to emerge which will bypass vaccines and we will be back to where we were a year ago.

themothman421 wrote: Definitely feeling the "not my damn problem anymore" vibe. The antivax 'publicans have acted with extreme selfishness and willful ignorance for over a goddamn year. No doubt there are more patient and compassionate people than me, but in my friend circles there is a definite feeling of "fuck em, they had their chance" that I can't help but subscribe to. Any shreds of empathy I have left are for the parents who are being forced to send their kids back to Delta-infested schools because their state legislators decided COVID was over and mask mandates are in fact our biggest threat to "freedom" in this country. That's the insane discourse being tossed around in Utah, anyway.

Any mask-wearing I do in public is done to trigger the precious antivax goons as much as it is to mitigate chances of a "breakthrough" or whatever.

Yeah, Utah has the standard issue weird GOP ugliness. I teach, and there was a law passed at the end of the last session making it illegal to require masks in higher education. They also passed a law that said schools need to have 75 percent of their classes face to face. How can you pass laws like this when the virus can mutate or health conditions can change? One of my coworkers is a state legislature and seems like a RINO. Pretty level headed. I sent her some information on how one state hosted street fairs and gave out vaccinations at the same time. She responded to me that she hasn't really changed her life much, hasn't gotten the virus, and that it seems random. This is a math professor. It has been four days and I'm trying to figure out how to respond in a meaningful manner. I'm fortunate in that my classes will be online and I've set up a home office now that campus will be crawling with disease vectors. I spent the last year working in my office on an empty floor.

In other news my 21-year-old son has severe anxiety and barely leaves his room. He hates us for traumatizing him, apparently, but is in no hurry to move out. He has been working on his mental health using youtube videos that I fear are the psychological equivalent of ISIS recruitment videos. I've given him the number of our healthcare provider screener contact so he can see a therapist. I can hear him listening to (podcasts?) in his room and laughing, so I'm glad he's at least temporarily not miserable. He has Asperger's which complicates everything, and his primary social contact, his sisters, have been gone for a while--one to Ukraine, and one to scout camp in Oregon. I know he misses them. My wife wants to invite him to move out, since she has been the target of his blame. They don't get along. It hurts to see him crying and upset about basically his entire life #therewillbegamestherapy

As of mid-September no unvaccinated people allowed in the office. I work for a major financial institution so if they are doing this other corps will to.

Had my first corona casualty. I'm having a get-together this weekend with some friends. I asked if everyone was vaccinated. One said "no, and I won't be." After discussing privately with everyone else, we decided that the popular workplace protocol would work for our risk tolerance -- either get vaxxed, or get a negative test. He declined that too. So he's not coming.

No mask mandates around here right now, but voluntary mask usage has been ramping up in recent weeks. I had a dental appointment this morning, and was required to follow the same safety protocols that were used at my previous six-month checkup, including wearing a mask whenever they weren't doing stuff to my teeth and gums. I have a haircut scheduled for this evening, and will be required to wear a mask during the whole appointment. That's the same procedure that they were following up until June.

Before the pandemic, I played boardgames on a monthly basis with a group of hipsters in Nordeast Minneapolis. The married couple that introduced me to the hosts of that group has now tested positive with Covid. They both got vaccinated last spring, but returned to their normal pre-pandemic social activities by late June. Their symptoms remain mild. Starting today, I will be masking for at least the next few weeks. There will probably be a post-Sturgis spike in cases around here. Also, the State Fair (2nd largest in America) is still supposedly happening this year, starting in two weeks. I live only a half mile away from the fairgrounds.

ubarose wrote: The Spawn asked a friend who hadn't been vaxxed yet because "possible side effects misinformation blah, blah" if he was a coward. She may have shamed him into getting vaxxed.

It probably is cowardice. Right-wing propaganda thrives on fear and drives a lot of the current vaccine skepticism. Any reasonable comparison of the numbers would lead to the obvious conclusion that people should get vaccinated. Over 635,000 Americans have died of Covid-19, and only 3 have died from a vaccine against Covid-19.

She may have shamed him into getting vaxxed.

That's what British girls did in World War I. If there was an able-bodied young man not in uniform they would ask why he hadn't enlisted and if they didn't like the answer, would pin a white feather to his lapel. It proved very effective.

I'll just mention to Shellhead that the Minnesota state government is being very proactive for me to get a vaccine, offering to help me with an appointment. I had business with their Interior department a while back and I think they harvested my email address from it.

MN Department of Health has texted me three times since I got my second shot last spring. Twice to notify me of nearby locations offering the vaccine, and once to encourage me to talk to any unvaccinated friends and family about getting the shot.

Some people seem willing to fill their bodies with unproven drugs, including horse dewormer now, rather than a proven vaccine.

n815e wrote: Some people seem willing to fill their bodies with unproven drugs, including horse dewormer now, rather than a proven vaccine.

This kind of stupidity has been around forever. When I was a kid, the idiom for this was "Cut off your nose to spite your face."

Walked past the usually dead local game store and it was full of Friday Night Magic players all masked up.