We’ve just quit testing again.
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I mean, the other thing too is that a lot of testing is not going to happen because of the bad weather. At least 1 testing site here closed when we got the big snow.
So numbers are going to be inaccurate for a while, I think.
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Dad and aunt got vaccinated today! And so did our nanny!!!
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Folks are cheering our very low positivity rate and not considering that the university is requiring students to get tested every 2 weeks so our number look really good compared to in the Fall when testing was not mandatory.
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Encouraging news to me is that hospitalizations are down. At least, that’s what I heard on NPR so I’m hoping that is true.
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Moral quandaries.
A family friend is a highish position in a public body and knows the head of one of the vaccination sites nearby. They have offered to call us if anyone no shows their vax appt. They’re also under considerable pressure to vaccinate minorities, which all of us are.
It feels gross because it’s through a “connection.” But we are adding to the overall vaccinated rate? I dunno. MrM is really on the fence. I’m dastardly enough that I just want the vaccine and figure everyone’s getting it whatever way they can anyway.
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Get the vaccine if it’s offered. No one else is more or less deserving than you and your family. This is a way to prevent the doses from going to waste, not kicking someone out of the spot in line.
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You getting a shot if someone no-shows is far better than the shot getting thrown out.
Husband and I got shots because (presumably) QAnon booked up appointments and no-showed en masse near us.
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Get it if it’s offered.
The “priority” lists seem to be one of the reasons people aren’t getting vaccines. There is so much focus on the “right” people, that it is slowing things down.
You would only be getting one if it would otherwise be going to waste. Getting it is a public service.
Don’t worry about your “connection”- if they have no people they know who need it, they go to waste. Someone has to be the connection.
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Gross is affluent folks going to clinics in poorer neighborhoods they’d never visit otherwise or fudging eligibility, and making lines longer/taking spots away from intended recipients.
If you’re called because of a no-show that seems like a very different story.
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You being vaccinated benefits everyone. You should take it if it’s offered. Sometimes that’s just how these things are.
My nephew got to go to preschool for free in a place that only offered free preschool for special needs kids. He doesn’t have special needs but got one of their “peer model” spots… because his grandma worked there. It just is what it is.
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Shots in arms are ultimately what matters, and healthcare systems are in a weird spot with extra vaccines. The optics are horrible for giving it to people that you’re connected to, but the alternative may be putting out a mass call and causing a mass rush and accusations of line skipping and stuff like that from a public optics perspective. So I think a lot of healthcare systems have to opt for something that is actually less fair but has better optics (because no one knows about it). Waitlists can only cover so much- Since they often focus on older adults, and older adults often have a hard time dropping everything to go and get a vaccine with no notice. And notably, your family bubble is large and intertwined- you guys are good candidates from a public health intervention perspective, because one infection would cause a lot of exposures. I would accept without hesitation in this case.
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Thank you all! Really helpful and MrM feels a lot better.
This is…horrible.
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This is also my view.
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I would rather see the doses used than go to waste. Connections or not take it.
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Another medscape, this on an FDA release
Cut for length- covid not transmitted by food or packaging
FDA: COVID-19 Not Transmitted by Food or Packaging
There is no evidence you can catch coronavirus through food or food packaging, the FDA and other government agencies said Thursday.
Since the pandemic began more than a year ago, the CDC and other health agencies have said they’re pretty certain the virus is not transmitted through food or food packages. The latest statement reconfirmed that idea.
“After more than a year since the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) outbreak was declared a global health emergency, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention continue to underscore that there is no credible evidence of food or food packaging associated with or as a likely source of viral transmission of severe acute respiratory syndromecoronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the virus causing COVID-19,” said the statement attributed to Janet Woodcock, MD, acting commissioner of food and drugs at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
The statement noted that COVID-19 is a respiratory illness spread person to person. Some researchers found small amounts of virus particles on food or food packaging, but infection usually requires a much higher number of particles, the statement said.
The statement said there’s an “international consensus” that the chances of infection from touching food packaging or eating food is extremely low, such as the recent opinion from the International Commission on Microbiological Specifications for Foods.
“Based on the scientific information that continues to be made available over the course of the pandemic, the USDA and FDA continue to be confident in the safety of the food available to American consumers and exported to international customers,” the statement said.
Sources:
FDA. “COVID-19 Update: USDA, FDA Underscore Current Epidemiologic and Scientific Information Indicating No Transmission of COVID-19 Through Food or Food Packaging.”
CDC. “Food and Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19).”
ICMF. “ICMSF Opinion on SARS-CoV-2 and its relationship to food safety.”
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I think we’re about to reach a very interesting inflection point. Really quickly vaccine availability is going to be ramping way up. Which is fantastic, but it means that pretty soon our struggles are going to shift from the supply side to the demand side. As we go forward, we’re going to find more and more people that can receive them that are turning them down, and come face-to-face with how close the numbers are to hitting heard immunity (or not). And I think our messaging around the efficacy and safety and general miraculousness of the vaccines have really been doing a disservice on this front. With the message of this sense of “well, you can still transmit it, don’t change anything you’re doing”, it makes a lot of people feel like “why bother”. I’m not sure how you balance public health messaging of the fact that we still need to be cautious but the fact that it truly does make a massive difference in disease severity and potential transmitability. I’m not sure I have any answers, but I sure feel like I can see a problem coming.
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For me and my friends the vaccine is letting us get our lives back. We will be able to eat out, go shopping and get together with friends.
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I cannot WAIT to get this thing in my arm even if I can still transmit it. As far as “don’t change anything you’re doing” - I will change what I am doing.
I will do grocery shopping in person. I will get medical care that I’ve been putting off. I will likely do in-store pickup of things that I’m currently paying to get delivered (here, stores will not do curbside pickup if you are on foot and not in a car, I tried, they make you come in.) I’ll feel a LOT better about my landlord forcing me to let repair people in, and there are a couple minor things that need fixed in here that I haven’t told her about because it’s not worth getting sick and dying for a “nice-to-have.” I might actually - OMG - get on public transport and go to a neighborhood that’s too far to walk to.
Granted, I will do all of these things masked and socially distanced and I still won’t do anything that involves a group or close contact. But some things definitely will change, because right now we’re not entering buildings other than our home for any reason, or getting on public transport because my friends tell me that no one is masked.
I do think that a lot of people will refuse the vaccine because they can’t immediately party. (Or shouldn’t - of course some still will.) That sucks. But, like, don’t officials HAVE to tell us to not change our behavior? Because otherwise people WILL immediately party.
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That’s the big public health question though isn’t it? Is it worth sending a less directive message, knowing that 2% of people will go out and throw massive parties, but that 20% more people overall will get vaccinated? Obviously those numbers are completely made up though. And that’s why public health is its own academic field 
it’s just a really interesting quandary. There is absolutely a cost to public health officials urging caution. It’s not a no risk action to take. The absolutist approach taken at the beginning of the AIDS epidemic is a clear example here.
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