#DanRather @DanRather 🤠Dear Dan, Dealing with #DELTA 🌊⏯ and the #DeltaExperience has brought us closer than ever before to the realization that Delta is not leaving at least not any time soon. We are so glad we have #Steady and you to help us navigate through🚢⛵ the sometimes rough waters. 🦄
Thank you for this platform, Dan! I have questions on this topic but want to ask outside of social media so as not to appear anti-vaxx. I'm very PRO-vaxx and have volunteered at vaccination clinics.
I was fully vaccinated in March and continued to wear my mask in public places. In July I attended a business function. Masks were provided but no one wore one.. two days later I became VERY sick - every symptom of Delta. Went to the clinic and got tested but it came back negative. The doctor said "I don't care if the test wasn't positive. I'm positive you have covid. I've seen and heard it for a year now so there's no question. You need to quarantine for 10 days", which I did. He also gave me a letter about the "high rate of false negatives" with the tests. It took me nearly 3 weeks to shake it. If the vaccination truly does help the severity, I'm very glad I got it!
My brother and sister in law were also both vaccinated in February and got sick at the same time in June. They were tested - my brother's was positive for covid and my sister in law's was negative, though her symptoms were much worse. Doesn't make sense.
My job is business to business and I've spoken to several who've been vaccinated but experienced breakthrough covid afterward.
It seems to me there's a big problem not being talked about...inaccurate testing. People are trying to do the right thing to see if they're sick with covid, but it comes back negative so they head back to work, school, their families, public places, etc. We need accurate results to ensure appropriate measure are taken in response!
Your thoughts, please? Thoughts from the medical professionals?
I work in a grocery store. Am fully vaccinated, still wearing my mask regardless of guidelines. I am tired with how people react when items are still not coming in. Um. If there are no people working to produce the products, then products don't come to our warehouse to be shipped to the stores. Don't yell & scream at the associates. I am tired that this is still the main news topic after 18+ months.
My wife is in hospital right now with a stubborn bacterial infection. We are both fully vaccinated, as are most of the hospital staff. But the hospital is FULL, to the point that when the doctor referred her for admission, she waited sixteen hours for a room to open; the evening nurse said some have waited up to 26 hours after referral for admission. I asked her if I needed to ask why the hospital was full and her response was, "Probably not."
As of Monday, this particular South Carolina hospital is implementing a "one visitor per patient per day" policy, with mask wear mandated even in patient rooms and, where possible, by patients.
I’m vaccinated. I am sorry for those who are holding out in getting the vaccine. They fear what repercussions may follow? I remember getting the polio vaccine and the smallpox one. There was no questioning it you just did it to be safe. There has been far more testing on the Covid vaccine than those. I wish this health issue wasn’t politicized!
I want to thank folks who responded - including some of the ones that called me an a-hole but I have been called worse by racist misogynists so it’s ok- I wanted to add that I have proudly seen all my Patients and never refused care and even when I feel a twinge of resentment which just means I am human I go out of my way to make sure I have done absolutely everything to take care of the patient knowing I might expose myself and then also reminding myself that I choose this profession and it is always a privilege. So for those commenters especially frank who wants to place hate in this forum - good luck to you- life is short and I can attest to that personally having watched good friends and colleagues die from this virus.
Looks like the moderation team has been deleting the worst comments from the troll, but take care of yourself. Your patients are very fortunate to have you! Be safe and stay healthy! 💜
Lot of gentle pursuation has been done to the majority of persons who do not want to be vaccinated. Now it is time for financial pursuation. All insurance companies should be encouraged to change their medical policies. Simple common sense: If you refuse to get vaccinated and you get any way effected by covid, you should consider that you do not have medical insurance. All expenses associated with such illness, will have to be paid from your own pocket with certain penalty to cover those who have been vaccinated but because of unvaccinated persons get effected from covid.
We are at a loss. My husband and I have been incredibly careful, resentlfully watching many of our friends and family travel and participate in large gatherings, even before they were vaccinated. We got vaccinated as soon as we were eligible in April. In June, we made the decision to plan a short trip to Kansas City, MO to see a concert and then baseball game. Now, with the trip a week away, we are considering canceling due to the latest news about breakthroughs and rise in cases in the area. We are incredibly bummed to be in this position (staycation AGAIN?), and mad as hell because it seems so unnecessary. Masks and vaccinations, they are tools for the greater good. Why is that (and science and facts) so hard to believe? Oh wait...
I’m frustrated with those who feel their rights are being violated when asked to wear a mask. My response to them is that I’ve done my part at being vaccinated and was happy when it was announced I no longer needed a mask in public. That changed because the virus changed. The Delta variant came along from unvaccinated people, now I’m back to mask-wearing because of those who were selfish about wearing a mask and vaccinating. It continues to blow my mind that even after seeing the sick and dying in the hospital regret their choices not to vaccinate that there are STILL people who refuse to vaccinate. Furthermore, I’m relieved to see the current administration require vaccinations in state employed settings. I want to know that when I go to a clinic or hospital I am safe. I still find it hard to believe that there are those in the medical profession who are not vaccinated. For those who are, thank you. I feel badly for the stress of doctors and nurses who have put their lives on the line caring for infected patients.
I’m still pretty scared. I have very old lungs that suffer from asthma & have always been susceptible to colds &/or pneumonia. I got the latest senior pneumonia vaccine a few years ago that helped tremendously. So, this latest variant is said to cling to lung cells better or more easily. If I’m going to be confined to quarters, more or less, with only food & drink delivery, why am I bothering? I haven’t seen family or friends in 18 months. Texting & emails & FB don’t hug & I crave hugs.
Banting & Best & Fleming & Salk & other scientists that have saved us from death years ago must be rolling over in their graves at the sheer stupidity of humans today.
Politicians who hunger for greed & power have no place in medicine & science.
Cable companies are shirking their responsibilities when they allow lies & propaganda to be spread, for ratings & the almighty dollar 💵 Shame on them!
How do I feel? I'm mad as hell, that's how I feel.
It's bad enough to have to deal with virus-deniers and anti-vaxxers and the merely hesitant (at least those folks have a minimal excuse, or did at the start), but when I see idiots like Florida Man deSantis ranting about masks and vaccinations as though they're worse than tattooing numbers on somebody's arm, my blood pressure skyrockets to unhealthy levels.
I haven't been much of a go-outer in recent years but wow, the idea of going to a movie and sit-down restaurant *really* sounds good, and yet - Uber Eats and Netflix, what shall we do again tonight?
600,000+ deaths in the United States alone - more than 2 million case worldwide (a number I'm positive is largely understated) - and wearing a piece of cloth over your face is just Too Much Trouble?
And please do NOT get me started on 'conservatives' who scream about THEIR personal rights while still maintaining they're entitled to police MY personal rights. Whose body, whose choice? The only problem is, one woman's abortion isn't likely to make her entire family sick, or even die - one person's refusal to get a poke in the arm, on the other hand... how many news stories have we seen lately about seriously ill people who gasp goshdarnit, maybe they should've gotten a shot after all, and made sure their family members got one as well.
If a mother (or father) refuses to get vaccinated and refuses to allow her children (of appropriate age) to be vaccinated because she thinks they're all somehow immune, yet one or more of them gets sick and perhaps dies (children, older family members, friends and neighbors, etc.), is that ok with you, considering all the ACTUAL lives that could be saved with one simple jab in the arm?
My body, my choice - you don't want an abortion? don't have one. This isn't the eternal abortion debate portion of the program. Your body, your choice - you don't want a vaccination? stay away from those of us who'd love to see an end to this at some point in our lifetimes. (I'd actually LIKE to be able to get in a pool again, shallow or deep ;) )
Rapists rarely wear condoms; any resultant pregnancy is not the female's fault. Condoms can fail; any resultant pregnancy is not the female's fault. Birth control pills, IUDs, Depo-Provera shots, implants, all methods of birth control can fail; any resultant pregnancy is not the female's fault. And yet you would force that female, who clearly did NOT want to have a child, to carry it to term? And then what? Bear the emotional effects of what comes next? - do I give it up for adoption and spend the rest of my life mourning that loss? Do I keep it and see the face of my rapist every time I look at it? What if I'm a teenager with my whole life ahead of me, and now I have a tiny person for whom I have 100% responsibility - no more school, little or no chance at career advancement (if I'm lucky enough to find a job, let alone a career path!), no social life, none of what my peers have. Nope, gosh, that darn condom broke or my boyfriend and I goofed one night or my Uncle Jervis raped me, so here we are.
There have always been abortions - there have not always been safe abortions. Illegal abortions are not safe. Those back-alley and clothes hanger stories aren't urban myths, they were reality for far too many of us, and women died. Often gruesomely. Others were damaged beyond repair and couldn't bear children once they actually wanted and were ready to have them.
Men (and it's nearly ALWAYS men) like to say that women should 'just say no' (how'd that work out for the so-called "War on Drugs"?) "Keep your legs closed." "Make adult decisions." "Don't have sex until you're ready to be a responsible parent." Human beings were given the delicious ability to enjoy sex outside of the evolutionary reproductive mandate - if you believe in a Creator, then S/he must have had a good reason for that, no?
Men can wander the planet siring hundreds - thousands! - of children and never even know the difference. Women don't have that luxury. Fathers' bodies don't undergo irreversible changes the way mothers' bodies do. A forensic anthropologist can dig up a 1000-year-old skeleton of a woman and tell whether or not she's given birth. Without DNA testing, nobody will ever know if you've sired even one child, Frank.
As for the other primary reasons women have abortions - significant health risks to the mother and non-viability of the fetus. You say "100% of potential births" but not all 100% of those pregnancies will make it to term. We have the ability to detect birth defects in utero; not all women (or families) have the emotional and financial capability to give birth to and raise a child with serious birth defects. Would you force them to do so anyway? What happens if they just can't do it, Frank? Who cares for the child then?
"Late-term abortions of viable fetuses." Well, no, that doesn't happen. If it's viable, it's coming out alive (we hope) and then the medicos and the mother decide what needs to be done next. The ONLY reason doctors perform late-term abortions is because there's an actual medical reason for it, not for 'convenience' or whatever one may otherwise assume.
And now we bring it back to the original topic, Covid-19, masks, and vaccinations. 600,000+ KNOWN deaths in the US, and it's only logical to 'assume' the total is underreported. Far too many died in the early days to have been autopsied; those deaths were listed as 'heart failure' or the like. Refrigerated trailers behind hospitals stacked with body bags. Terrified public officials forbidding their health departments to report deaths as due to Covid-19 - yes, it happened, may still be happening even now. Underreporting of deaths in nursing homes; you may want to check with Gov. Cuomo's prosecution teams on that.
Sadly, no, deaths haven't been limited to the elderly or to those with underlying conditions. Infants, teenagers, people of all ages have died. A 16-year-old just died this week in Florida (color me shocked).
How many accounts have you read of superspreader events? A family reunion or wedding, nobody paid attention to the warnings, and people got sick, ended up in the hospital, died. What began as a joyful time turned into a time of grief and mourning. One randy guy in a group would be extraordinarily unlikely to impregnate half a dozen females at a family reunion (geez, I'd hope not!) - one infected person could sicken or kill that many or more.
I'm not particularly concerned about getting Covid, Frank. I'm fully vaccinated, I'll get a booster if and when it's appropriate - even yearly, if it comes to that, the same way I get a flu shot every year. I may end up with a break-through case, but I'm comfortable knowing the chances of my needing hospitalization are extremely low - because, among other things, I wear a dang mask every time I step out into public.
It's not all about me - it's all about US. US as a country, US as a collective of human beings. For the public good, as the saying goes. Didn't we as a country once care about each other as well as ourselves? I had a friend who'd had polio because she was born before the Salk vaccine came out (Mitch McConnell did as well, btw). I remember 'no spitting' signs on public transportation, not because it's disgusting but because it could spread TB. Nobody gets polio anymore. Nobody gets tuberculosis. Nobody gets smallpox or German measles or dozens of other diseases - because we have vaccines.
I just don't know how I could live with myself knowing my callous disregard of others resulted in their illness or death, when all it would take to prevent it would be to wear a mask and get a shot. Seems like a simple choice.
Facebook, Instagram and Twitter allow the spread of conspiracy theories and falsehoods from those “who don't believe in climate change, who don't think people should take the vaccine, who think there was wide spread voter fraud, and who think Biden stole the election.” a quote by Mathew Dowd. Facebook, Instagram and Twitter are responsible for all of this and more by allowing The Disinformation Dozen as they have been referred to; Joseph Mercola, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Ty and Charlene Bollinger, Sherri Tenpenny, Rizza Islam, Rashid Buttar, Erin Elizabeth, Sayer Ji, Kelly Brogan, Christiane Northrup, Ben Tapper, and Kevin Jenkins to spread their conspiracy theories and falsehoods on their platforms. They are responsible for up to 75% of anti-vaccine falsehoods being spread on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, just so they can enrich themselves by spreading anti-vaccine falsehoods and selling false remedies to combat the Covid virus. The anti-vaccination industry, including The Disinformation Dozen, generate up to $1.1 billion in annual revenue for social media giants while lining their own pockets with millions. Despite repeatedly violating Facebook, Instagram and Twitter’s terms of service agreements, nine of the Disinformation Dozen still till this day remain on all three platforms, while just three have been removed from just one platform. We need government authorities, including regulators and prosecutors, to take action to establish the scale of their malignant activity and then clamp down on criminal profiteering from health misinformation. Facebook, Instagram and Twitter are endangering the lives the health and wellbeing of all Americans and especially the most vulnerable our children and grandchildren by allowing these anti-vaccine falsehoods to be spread on their social media platforms.
Listen Gary- This is at the heart of the problem. These corporate leaders are doing this to make $$$$ and we need to stop them. The tech companies are in the center of this.
I wish I had the power to change all of this. And the rest of the country would stand up. I think TV was probably the worst invention of the 20th century. Brain washing.
We have pulled back and resumed deliveries and curbside pickup. My husband and I walk around the neighborhood for exercise, but we try to go at times when most other people are at work. We are resentful that the non-vaxers have created this needless, dangerous situation. We have small children in our lives who cannot yet receive the vaccine, so we are very cautious.
I am continually amazed that people can't understand basic principles of science. They have no trouble understanding that tomorrow's weather may not be the same as today's, but they can't grasp that a virus will change if given opportunity.
#DanRather @DanRather 🤠Dear Dan, Dealing with #DELTA 🌊⏯ and the #DeltaExperience has brought us closer than ever before to the realization that Delta is not leaving at least not any time soon. We are so glad we have #Steady and you to help us navigate through🚢⛵ the sometimes rough waters. 🦄
Thank you for this platform, Dan! I have questions on this topic but want to ask outside of social media so as not to appear anti-vaxx. I'm very PRO-vaxx and have volunteered at vaccination clinics.
I was fully vaccinated in March and continued to wear my mask in public places. In July I attended a business function. Masks were provided but no one wore one.. two days later I became VERY sick - every symptom of Delta. Went to the clinic and got tested but it came back negative. The doctor said "I don't care if the test wasn't positive. I'm positive you have covid. I've seen and heard it for a year now so there's no question. You need to quarantine for 10 days", which I did. He also gave me a letter about the "high rate of false negatives" with the tests. It took me nearly 3 weeks to shake it. If the vaccination truly does help the severity, I'm very glad I got it!
My brother and sister in law were also both vaccinated in February and got sick at the same time in June. They were tested - my brother's was positive for covid and my sister in law's was negative, though her symptoms were much worse. Doesn't make sense.
My job is business to business and I've spoken to several who've been vaccinated but experienced breakthrough covid afterward.
It seems to me there's a big problem not being talked about...inaccurate testing. People are trying to do the right thing to see if they're sick with covid, but it comes back negative so they head back to work, school, their families, public places, etc. We need accurate results to ensure appropriate measure are taken in response!
Your thoughts, please? Thoughts from the medical professionals?
I work in a grocery store. Am fully vaccinated, still wearing my mask regardless of guidelines. I am tired with how people react when items are still not coming in. Um. If there are no people working to produce the products, then products don't come to our warehouse to be shipped to the stores. Don't yell & scream at the associates. I am tired that this is still the main news topic after 18+ months.
My wife is in hospital right now with a stubborn bacterial infection. We are both fully vaccinated, as are most of the hospital staff. But the hospital is FULL, to the point that when the doctor referred her for admission, she waited sixteen hours for a room to open; the evening nurse said some have waited up to 26 hours after referral for admission. I asked her if I needed to ask why the hospital was full and her response was, "Probably not."
As of Monday, this particular South Carolina hospital is implementing a "one visitor per patient per day" policy, with mask wear mandated even in patient rooms and, where possible, by patients.
I’m vaccinated. I am sorry for those who are holding out in getting the vaccine. They fear what repercussions may follow? I remember getting the polio vaccine and the smallpox one. There was no questioning it you just did it to be safe. There has been far more testing on the Covid vaccine than those. I wish this health issue wasn’t politicized!
Maybe the minority communities in the southern states should all band together and gay vaccinated so they will be around for the next election.
I meant get, not gay
I want to thank folks who responded - including some of the ones that called me an a-hole but I have been called worse by racist misogynists so it’s ok- I wanted to add that I have proudly seen all my Patients and never refused care and even when I feel a twinge of resentment which just means I am human I go out of my way to make sure I have done absolutely everything to take care of the patient knowing I might expose myself and then also reminding myself that I choose this profession and it is always a privilege. So for those commenters especially frank who wants to place hate in this forum - good luck to you- life is short and I can attest to that personally having watched good friends and colleagues die from this virus.
Looks like the moderation team has been deleting the worst comments from the troll, but take care of yourself. Your patients are very fortunate to have you! Be safe and stay healthy! 💜
Lot of gentle pursuation has been done to the majority of persons who do not want to be vaccinated. Now it is time for financial pursuation. All insurance companies should be encouraged to change their medical policies. Simple common sense: If you refuse to get vaccinated and you get any way effected by covid, you should consider that you do not have medical insurance. All expenses associated with such illness, will have to be paid from your own pocket with certain penalty to cover those who have been vaccinated but because of unvaccinated persons get effected from covid.
We are at a loss. My husband and I have been incredibly careful, resentlfully watching many of our friends and family travel and participate in large gatherings, even before they were vaccinated. We got vaccinated as soon as we were eligible in April. In June, we made the decision to plan a short trip to Kansas City, MO to see a concert and then baseball game. Now, with the trip a week away, we are considering canceling due to the latest news about breakthroughs and rise in cases in the area. We are incredibly bummed to be in this position (staycation AGAIN?), and mad as hell because it seems so unnecessary. Masks and vaccinations, they are tools for the greater good. Why is that (and science and facts) so hard to believe? Oh wait...
I’m frustrated with those who feel their rights are being violated when asked to wear a mask. My response to them is that I’ve done my part at being vaccinated and was happy when it was announced I no longer needed a mask in public. That changed because the virus changed. The Delta variant came along from unvaccinated people, now I’m back to mask-wearing because of those who were selfish about wearing a mask and vaccinating. It continues to blow my mind that even after seeing the sick and dying in the hospital regret their choices not to vaccinate that there are STILL people who refuse to vaccinate. Furthermore, I’m relieved to see the current administration require vaccinations in state employed settings. I want to know that when I go to a clinic or hospital I am safe. I still find it hard to believe that there are those in the medical profession who are not vaccinated. For those who are, thank you. I feel badly for the stress of doctors and nurses who have put their lives on the line caring for infected patients.
I’m still pretty scared. I have very old lungs that suffer from asthma & have always been susceptible to colds &/or pneumonia. I got the latest senior pneumonia vaccine a few years ago that helped tremendously. So, this latest variant is said to cling to lung cells better or more easily. If I’m going to be confined to quarters, more or less, with only food & drink delivery, why am I bothering? I haven’t seen family or friends in 18 months. Texting & emails & FB don’t hug & I crave hugs.
Banting & Best & Fleming & Salk & other scientists that have saved us from death years ago must be rolling over in their graves at the sheer stupidity of humans today.
Politicians who hunger for greed & power have no place in medicine & science.
Cable companies are shirking their responsibilities when they allow lies & propaganda to be spread, for ratings & the almighty dollar 💵 Shame on them!
How do I feel? I'm mad as hell, that's how I feel.
It's bad enough to have to deal with virus-deniers and anti-vaxxers and the merely hesitant (at least those folks have a minimal excuse, or did at the start), but when I see idiots like Florida Man deSantis ranting about masks and vaccinations as though they're worse than tattooing numbers on somebody's arm, my blood pressure skyrockets to unhealthy levels.
I haven't been much of a go-outer in recent years but wow, the idea of going to a movie and sit-down restaurant *really* sounds good, and yet - Uber Eats and Netflix, what shall we do again tonight?
600,000+ deaths in the United States alone - more than 2 million case worldwide (a number I'm positive is largely understated) - and wearing a piece of cloth over your face is just Too Much Trouble?
And please do NOT get me started on 'conservatives' who scream about THEIR personal rights while still maintaining they're entitled to police MY personal rights. Whose body, whose choice? The only problem is, one woman's abortion isn't likely to make her entire family sick, or even die - one person's refusal to get a poke in the arm, on the other hand... how many news stories have we seen lately about seriously ill people who gasp goshdarnit, maybe they should've gotten a shot after all, and made sure their family members got one as well.
If a mother (or father) refuses to get vaccinated and refuses to allow her children (of appropriate age) to be vaccinated because she thinks they're all somehow immune, yet one or more of them gets sick and perhaps dies (children, older family members, friends and neighbors, etc.), is that ok with you, considering all the ACTUAL lives that could be saved with one simple jab in the arm?
My body, my choice - you don't want an abortion? don't have one. This isn't the eternal abortion debate portion of the program. Your body, your choice - you don't want a vaccination? stay away from those of us who'd love to see an end to this at some point in our lifetimes. (I'd actually LIKE to be able to get in a pool again, shallow or deep ;) )
Rapists rarely wear condoms; any resultant pregnancy is not the female's fault. Condoms can fail; any resultant pregnancy is not the female's fault. Birth control pills, IUDs, Depo-Provera shots, implants, all methods of birth control can fail; any resultant pregnancy is not the female's fault. And yet you would force that female, who clearly did NOT want to have a child, to carry it to term? And then what? Bear the emotional effects of what comes next? - do I give it up for adoption and spend the rest of my life mourning that loss? Do I keep it and see the face of my rapist every time I look at it? What if I'm a teenager with my whole life ahead of me, and now I have a tiny person for whom I have 100% responsibility - no more school, little or no chance at career advancement (if I'm lucky enough to find a job, let alone a career path!), no social life, none of what my peers have. Nope, gosh, that darn condom broke or my boyfriend and I goofed one night or my Uncle Jervis raped me, so here we are.
There have always been abortions - there have not always been safe abortions. Illegal abortions are not safe. Those back-alley and clothes hanger stories aren't urban myths, they were reality for far too many of us, and women died. Often gruesomely. Others were damaged beyond repair and couldn't bear children once they actually wanted and were ready to have them.
Men (and it's nearly ALWAYS men) like to say that women should 'just say no' (how'd that work out for the so-called "War on Drugs"?) "Keep your legs closed." "Make adult decisions." "Don't have sex until you're ready to be a responsible parent." Human beings were given the delicious ability to enjoy sex outside of the evolutionary reproductive mandate - if you believe in a Creator, then S/he must have had a good reason for that, no?
Men can wander the planet siring hundreds - thousands! - of children and never even know the difference. Women don't have that luxury. Fathers' bodies don't undergo irreversible changes the way mothers' bodies do. A forensic anthropologist can dig up a 1000-year-old skeleton of a woman and tell whether or not she's given birth. Without DNA testing, nobody will ever know if you've sired even one child, Frank.
As for the other primary reasons women have abortions - significant health risks to the mother and non-viability of the fetus. You say "100% of potential births" but not all 100% of those pregnancies will make it to term. We have the ability to detect birth defects in utero; not all women (or families) have the emotional and financial capability to give birth to and raise a child with serious birth defects. Would you force them to do so anyway? What happens if they just can't do it, Frank? Who cares for the child then?
"Late-term abortions of viable fetuses." Well, no, that doesn't happen. If it's viable, it's coming out alive (we hope) and then the medicos and the mother decide what needs to be done next. The ONLY reason doctors perform late-term abortions is because there's an actual medical reason for it, not for 'convenience' or whatever one may otherwise assume.
And now we bring it back to the original topic, Covid-19, masks, and vaccinations. 600,000+ KNOWN deaths in the US, and it's only logical to 'assume' the total is underreported. Far too many died in the early days to have been autopsied; those deaths were listed as 'heart failure' or the like. Refrigerated trailers behind hospitals stacked with body bags. Terrified public officials forbidding their health departments to report deaths as due to Covid-19 - yes, it happened, may still be happening even now. Underreporting of deaths in nursing homes; you may want to check with Gov. Cuomo's prosecution teams on that.
Sadly, no, deaths haven't been limited to the elderly or to those with underlying conditions. Infants, teenagers, people of all ages have died. A 16-year-old just died this week in Florida (color me shocked).
How many accounts have you read of superspreader events? A family reunion or wedding, nobody paid attention to the warnings, and people got sick, ended up in the hospital, died. What began as a joyful time turned into a time of grief and mourning. One randy guy in a group would be extraordinarily unlikely to impregnate half a dozen females at a family reunion (geez, I'd hope not!) - one infected person could sicken or kill that many or more.
I'm not particularly concerned about getting Covid, Frank. I'm fully vaccinated, I'll get a booster if and when it's appropriate - even yearly, if it comes to that, the same way I get a flu shot every year. I may end up with a break-through case, but I'm comfortable knowing the chances of my needing hospitalization are extremely low - because, among other things, I wear a dang mask every time I step out into public.
It's not all about me - it's all about US. US as a country, US as a collective of human beings. For the public good, as the saying goes. Didn't we as a country once care about each other as well as ourselves? I had a friend who'd had polio because she was born before the Salk vaccine came out (Mitch McConnell did as well, btw). I remember 'no spitting' signs on public transportation, not because it's disgusting but because it could spread TB. Nobody gets polio anymore. Nobody gets tuberculosis. Nobody gets smallpox or German measles or dozens of other diseases - because we have vaccines.
I just don't know how I could live with myself knowing my callous disregard of others resulted in their illness or death, when all it would take to prevent it would be to wear a mask and get a shot. Seems like a simple choice.
Facebook, Instagram and Twitter allow the spread of conspiracy theories and falsehoods from those “who don't believe in climate change, who don't think people should take the vaccine, who think there was wide spread voter fraud, and who think Biden stole the election.” a quote by Mathew Dowd. Facebook, Instagram and Twitter are responsible for all of this and more by allowing The Disinformation Dozen as they have been referred to; Joseph Mercola, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Ty and Charlene Bollinger, Sherri Tenpenny, Rizza Islam, Rashid Buttar, Erin Elizabeth, Sayer Ji, Kelly Brogan, Christiane Northrup, Ben Tapper, and Kevin Jenkins to spread their conspiracy theories and falsehoods on their platforms. They are responsible for up to 75% of anti-vaccine falsehoods being spread on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, just so they can enrich themselves by spreading anti-vaccine falsehoods and selling false remedies to combat the Covid virus. The anti-vaccination industry, including The Disinformation Dozen, generate up to $1.1 billion in annual revenue for social media giants while lining their own pockets with millions. Despite repeatedly violating Facebook, Instagram and Twitter’s terms of service agreements, nine of the Disinformation Dozen still till this day remain on all three platforms, while just three have been removed from just one platform. We need government authorities, including regulators and prosecutors, to take action to establish the scale of their malignant activity and then clamp down on criminal profiteering from health misinformation. Facebook, Instagram and Twitter are endangering the lives the health and wellbeing of all Americans and especially the most vulnerable our children and grandchildren by allowing these anti-vaccine falsehoods to be spread on their social media platforms.
Listen Gary- This is at the heart of the problem. These corporate leaders are doing this to make $$$$ and we need to stop them. The tech companies are in the center of this.
I wish I had the power to change all of this. And the rest of the country would stand up. I think TV was probably the worst invention of the 20th century. Brain washing.
I say “be the good guy behind the mask, love thy neighbor and get vaxxed.”
We have pulled back and resumed deliveries and curbside pickup. My husband and I walk around the neighborhood for exercise, but we try to go at times when most other people are at work. We are resentful that the non-vaxers have created this needless, dangerous situation. We have small children in our lives who cannot yet receive the vaccine, so we are very cautious.
I am continually amazed that people can't understand basic principles of science. They have no trouble understanding that tomorrow's weather may not be the same as today's, but they can't grasp that a virus will change if given opportunity.
Ignorance is no longer bliss - it is death.