I am a little confused about the vaccine. I see that the president was pushing for it to be ready before the election and was upset that it wasn’t. Geraldo wants it named after the president. This would indicate that the Republicans are trying to get a vaccine out and distributed to the population. OK, that sounds like a good thing. Then I see someone on the left saying that we should all get the vaccine as soon as it is available to the general public and the right went nuts on him.
So was the push by the president simply to garner votes from people on the fence that he was taking the pandemic more seriously but his base still thinks this is BS? Am I missing some other motivations? Maybe the responses I saw were from a primarily anti-vaxxer crowd but they sure didn’t read that way. I tried to find the Twitter feed I saw this morning and failed, so I can’t provide any linkages.
Who were “the right” that went nuts? If it was twitter commenters, they are idiots. Not specific to this issue, but in general they are idiots.
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lol . . . And I can see you giving me that particular finger with that same expression on your face as in your (current) avatar. 
Here is my question. Once we have vaccinated the most at risk can we start to lift restrictions as we vaccinate the rest (like me)? Also can we just say eff off to everyone that doesn’t get vaccinated? I mean if they refuse we don’t have to keep trying to protect them right? There is no longer risk to almost everyone who is vaccinated at the rates they are talking about so tough poop to you if you choose to not do the vaccine. Am I missing anything?
Since most of those restrictions protect “others”, not the person being restricted, and since i anticipate it will take a while for all the people who want to get vaccinated to do so, i hope not.
That is, i am not “most at risk”. But I’m pretty damn terrified of getting this, and i hope you continue wearing a mask until a few weeks after i get my second dose of vaccine. And that will likely be many months after “the most vulnerable” get vaccinated.
Well just like with any vaccine, there will still be unvaccinated “innocents” like infants and people who are allergic to the ingredients or have compromised immune systems and can’t tolerate the vaccine. So we need to rely on herd immunity to protect them.
Where I live you can’t go to public school if you’re not following the recommended vaccine schedule or have a valid medical reason not to. But that will only catch children, not adults. Still, it’s better than nothing. Maybe add the Covid-19 vaccine to the list of vaccinations a kid must have starting with the 2021-2022 school year? Standard exceptions for those who truly can’t get it.
I think we should lift the restrictions (what very minor restrictions we have… Bars close at 10? Give me a break) when the numbers drop, indicating herd immunity is finally kicking in.
I mean, the major restriction is that people are asked to wear masks. And there’s tons of bitching about that. And i just don’t get it. Do people bitch about needing to wear shoes? Do they worry about getting “shoe breaks” during the day? I mean, i actually took “shoe breaks” when i worked at the office. I would take my shoes off when I was going to be sitting behind my desk for a while, where no one would notice. But i didn’t whine about it, or worry that there might be a day when i wouldn’t get a shoe breaks.
Like shoes, a bad mask, or a badly fitting one, can be uncomfortable. Like shoes, a good mask is just another thing you wear in certain circumstances.
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Not being able to go see family and friends at the holidays is a major restriction.
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I love the analogy
But not a legal restriction, just a self-imposed one.
I do intend to dial back on those a couple of weeks after I am vaccinated. I will likely return to hanging out at friends’ houses in the evening in small indoor social gatherings. I will return to eating with my mother and my adult children. Those are huge, life-changing restrictions, but they are all legal for me to do today.
I expect my mom, who is elderly and high-risk, to get vaccinated before I do. But I won’t hang out unmasked with her (without taking extreme precautions – I have been quarantining for the last two weeks so we can have a quick, stressful thanksgiving meal together) until we have both been vaccinated. Even great vaccines aren’t 100%, and it’s more likely to fail to protect her than me, due to her high-risk factors.
Well some of us have family overseas, and a visit is either impossible, or the 14 day foreigner quarantine would make it pointless.
I do wonder if masks will become a cultural thing in the way they are (apparently) in East Asia, where people wear them if they’re sick. They’re seemingly both quite effective against airborne disease and yet so low cost it wouldn’t be a horrible thing if we were a little more careful (i.e. masks in public sort of thing) during peak flu season in normal years.
True. I guess a lot of countries will have to weigh in before those restrictions are relaxed.
Perhaps not culturally, but at least he stigma about wearing masks in the West is broken for good, I hope. At least the people who want to wear them won’t feel weird about wearing them anymore.
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I hope so, but I’m not optimistic.
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I’m certainly pessimistic about widespread cultural adoption across the US, but I could see Northeast + Northwest doing it. Just another cultural difference to add to the list…
I’ve wondered the same. If sick people can’t or won’t stay home, hopefully after all this, wearing a mask will be normalized.
So, why are holidays so important? We can have a great Thanksgiving in May after enough people are vaccinated.
As it stands, we’ll have another record surge in about 20 days. Then another in 20 days after Christmas. Because holidays are so important.
It’s like watching a recorded soccer match… it’s just not the same
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