Where I Am Right Now
We’re once again entering a state of COVID whiplash. It’s those periods of time when they announce the end of COVID restrictions or masking while simultaneously announcing a new variant. Is it problematic? This doctor says no. These doctors say yes. And this doctor says we just don’t know enough yet, but we’ve seen this situation before and can look at country X and learn Y…
THIS. This more than the unknowns at the beginning of the pandemic is exhausting. The conversation around removing masks is exhausting. Our area is moving to optional masking this weekend because case loads are going down and the CDC issued new guidance. But we’ve been here before. At least three times so far.
The Atlantic captured where I am right now: “The pandemic is not over. But if we let it, this stretch may be defined less by what we can’t do, and more by what we safely, carefully, finally can.”
I don’t feel limited at all by my limits. I mean, yes, I do not do as much as I did pre-COVID, but that makes sense because we’re not pre-COVID. We’re still in the pandemic. Life has changed, and I’ve changed with it. But I don’t feel limited like I did pre-vaccine when I went nowhere and did nothing. I now go to the theater regularly. The kids go to school. We visit people indoors while masked. We socialize outdoors unmasked and distanced. We are considering traveling.
The only things we don’t do are things that require us to remove our masks while near people. So we still only do takeaway and not dine-in (or even dine outside because most tables are too close together). We don’t socialize with food or drink indoors. And we’re waiting for caseloads to be low enough for maskless sleepovers. All things we’d love to do, but we’re willing to wait to keep ourselves and others safer.
Others may make other decisions, and I think all decisions are valid when they are made using the information we have (eg. I am triple-vaccinated and always wear a KN-95 mask tightly to my face, and these two things make me less likely to infect anyone else or become infected while socializing) vs. ignoring information that we don’t like and hoping for an outcome that may or may not happen. At this point, we know what spreads the virus.
It all falls under the Atlantic’s advice at the end that we need to: “come to a mutual understanding about taking risks wisely, about selecting joys judiciously, about distributing protection as widely and equitably as we can.”
I am tired thinking about this next variant and watching the stories move from “nothing to worry about” to “wait, should we be worried?” to “yes, we should be worried” to “the hospitals are full but how could we have ever known this would happen?” I wish we could just skip from “yes, we should be worried” to “look at us — we stopped a spike from happening and saved X number of lives.” THAT would be amazing — a chance to actually stamp down the pandemic vs. ignoring the still glowing embers.
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Fortunately (?), it seems everyone in my area has had Covid at least twice, so we should have reached herd immunity by now. /s🙄
I am tired. But I am also resolved to the idea that this is never going away and I will always be more cautious around other people.
That would be amazing. My kids’ schools go to mask optional tomorrow and I’m concerned. They will still be masking, as will I when I volunteer in the building. I hope we truly are nearing the end. But I feel like we have been here before and it’s still not over. I’m so tired.
Yeah. All of this. I’m forever reminded how badly this entire pandemic is managed as there is no clear messaging. Zero. No one is leading us through this global crisis. Everyone has their own spin on the limited data (don’t get me started on how limited it is as testing and tracking has always been the lowest of low priorities). As a scientist, I really want to give the leaders a dressing down (especially after 6 years of graduate school and post-doc experiences that leave HR departments sweating).
We need to transition to endemic. This virus with all its variants are here to stay. But, we need to do so with clear communication about the data. Vaccines are the gold standard for protection. Listen to the misinformation and forgoing vaccines is like leaving your door open when there’s armed assailants roaming your neighborhood. Masks are secondary. They work, but you need to be vaccinated to train your immune system for infection (cause it’s going to happen):
I’ve been immersing myself in all materials about Long-COVID, autoimmunity, and the connection between biological gender and immunity. The recent data about EpBv linked with MS explains so much and frightens me. Seeing the data about COVID and pregnancy loss and complications makes me want to slap people. The infertility spike is coming. It all makes me angry at leadership for failing (despite their claims they are superior to the rest of us).
So yes. Abiding with you. Stewing with you. Thinking of you.
I continue to be amazed at the atrociously bad decisions being made.
I’ve come to the understanding espoused by trusted scientists/docs/etc that masks are not secondary—they prevent transmission/exposure/infection, whereas vaccines mostly lessen the severity of infection. So relying on vaccines alone is like doing away with speed limits, drunk driving laws, road maintenance, etc. bc we have seat belts.
I can’t believe governments are taking the view that it’s all over and it’s time to go back to normal when the under 5s don’t even have a vaccine. Like I thought we all could agree that it behooved us as a civilized society to tolerate some small inconveniences to keep our littlest members safe.
My idiot premier wants to scrap mask mandates (and is dumping vaccine passports tomorrow) by the end of the month, including in schools. Meanwhile he’s done nothing to encourage 5-11 vaccination so the rates in that age group are abysmal.
I’m so tired and angry. Long Covid scares the shit out of me.
Update: the same day a new report comes out showing the Pfizer vaccine is way less effective in 5-11 (my kids) my governor decides we don’t need masks in schools anymore. 🥴 and as Turia notes, the vax rate in 5-11 is very low (below 30% where I live) and under 5s can’t even get vaxxed (and no masks needed in daycare either, magically).
It’s such a strange time right now as you say. Restrictions are being eased here but I worry it’s too soon. There is still no vaccine available for under 5s so we are still being very cautious. However so many of the people around us are acting like pre-pandemic times. I think a lot of people just want it to be over so badly that they are pretending it is.
I live in the same area as Turia. Even our chief medical officer admitted this week that the true number of new daily cases is probably 10 times what’s being reported, because they have restricted testing so much. That means we actually have 20,000+ new cases every day, not the 2,000+ being reported (which is bad enough, and as high as the peak numbers of the first wave back in 2020). And yet they just scrapped vaccine passports and capacity limits, and no doubt masks will be gone by the end of the month as well — because, hey! there’s an election coming up and a base to pander to. (eyeroll/scowl) So I guess we’re going to be hibernating at home for a while yet…