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Vaccinated Americans now may go without masks in most places, the CDC said

nytimes.com

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Re: Vaccinated Americans now may go without masks in most places, the CDC said

#491

Post by kelnos »

cfeduke wrote: post #348
kiawe_fire wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems pretty logical to me. Every decision is a risk/reward calculation. The vaccine does carry the risk of side effects and adverse reactions. That risk, for most, is VERY small. But if the person in question also has very low risk of contracting or spreading Covid (works from home, rarely goes out, young, healthy) and if being vaccinated doesn’t actually enable you to live any differently than you already are, t…

The logical decision here involves civic duty. I certainly fit into the low risk category, etc., but I also exist in society and am a willing participant, and as such have certain responsibilities to other people in my community.

As an American, I can tell you that most Americans aren't big on civic duty. And when we are, it's mostly limited to getting out to vote and not complaining too much when selected for jury duty.

American individualism also tends to downplay a person's responsibility to anyone outside their family, which some even restrict to their immediate nuclear family.

It's a shame, and I think it's one of our biggest failings as a culture. Ironically this is one of the few things where the American left and right are fairly on the same page, even if most won't admit it.

(I'm painting a pretty dire picture here, but it really isn't that bad. Communities exist everywhere, and people who care about others exist everywhere. It just seems like when the chips are down, people tend to turn inward rather than outward.)

Re: Vaccinated Americans now may go without masks in most places, the CDC said

#492

Post by cmckn »

herbst wrote: post #394
cmckn wrote: post #328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this stems from the perception that the US federal government is monolithic, secretive, and imperceptible. The reality is that it's wildly diverse, staffed by "everyday" Americans, takes place almost entirely in the open, and very knowable (even if there is complexity -- just like computers). In the same way that many modern humans have grown distant from "nature," Americans have grown distant from our own go…

From and outside perspective this government you are describing is only hard to visualize. For years now voting comes down to the lesser of two evils where everywhere else in the world new parties form and establish new ideas America still has two of them only, kinda. As Swiss it's also far from our understanding what democracy is supposed to be.

A ton of Americans think of it as a lesser of two evils; because many (most?) Americans have the luxury of being comfortable. They don’t really think about politics, they don’t really have policy wants/needs. It’s just sensationalism on Facebook and celebrity on Instagram. It’s more about sports-team tribalism than participating in a society. At the risk of sounding morose, I don’t know where we go from here. Everyone, myself included, is going insane.

Re: Vaccinated Americans now may go without masks in most places, the CDC said

#493

Post by jbjohns »

bb123 wrote: post #448
nexuist wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a worryingly large constituency, mostly on Twitter, who believe that any unjust death at all is damning evidence that all of our institutions and economic systems must be destroyed and rebuilt. Of course unjust death is tragic, but it's not an excuse to throw out all of society and start over again. I think many of these people saw mask mandates as that "rebuilding society" step, and to get rid of it so quic…

I’d be pretty careful drawing any conclusions about the mood of the nation from Twitter. The Twitter crowd are very loud and quite extremist but I believe they are small in number. To be honest I’d just avoid Twitter all together. Nothing good comes out of it.

I wish companies and politicians would follow your recommendation.

Re: Vaccinated Americans now may go without masks in most places, the CDC said

#494

Post by cout »

ddxxdd wrote: post #428
cycomanic wrote: post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know this gets repeated a lot, but that doesn't make it more true. Show me the quote where he said "we lied about masks", and "we changed our message about masks" doesn't count. The reality is that the knowledge about Covid changed significantly in march/April last year. In particular the understanding about unsymptomatic spread lead to a significant change of thinking. That makes sense, if the virus only spreads f…

2 weeks of asymptomatic spread has been known about since late January (edit: in 2020). [0] And Fauci said at one point (2/14/2020): “There is no reason for anyone right now in the United States, with regard to coronavirus, to wear a mask” [1] And at another point (6/15/2020): "[...] we were concerned the public health community, and many people were saying this, were concerned that it was at a time when personal pro…

The director of the CDC during most of the pandemic was Robert Redfield. Dr. Fauci is director of the NIH, so his statements are not relevant to the credibility of the CDC.

In defense of Dr. Fauci's statement, saying "there is no reason right now to wear a mask" is quite different from "masks are ineffective", as it keeps getting paraphrased. The latter is obviously absurd, as there were numerous studies on the effectiveness of masks against various viruses prior to 2020, just not against SARS-CoV-2 specifically, since as far as we know it didn't exist yet.

Re: Vaccinated Americans now may go without masks in most places, the CDC said

#495

Post by usrusr »

avereveard wrote: post #404
cycomanic wrote: post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know this gets repeated a lot, but that doesn't make it more true. Show me the quote where he said "we lied about masks", and "we changed our message about masks" doesn't count. The reality is that the knowledge about Covid changed significantly in march/April last year. In particular the understanding about unsymptomatic spread lead to a significant change of thinking. That makes sense, if the virus only spreads f…

If they didn't suspect that an "atypical pneumonia" as it was called since the beginning had an aereosol component a case can be made that they were unfit for their job If mask initial recommendation actually was a white lie a case can be made that they are unfit for communicating their results to the masses as they think their peers to be petulant children unfit for handling truths, and they should be stripped of th…

The “not aerosol“ hypothesis was based on the assumption that the spread rate would have been much higher than observed with an aerosol capable virus. Turns out this one just happened to be quite bad at spreading amongst humans, despite being capable of residing in the air for quite a while. It's rather unsurprising then that we now see many mutations that fix some low hanging fruit "bugs", bringing the spread closer to what people would have expected. Arguably hope may have been a factor in weighing that hypothesis, but that's truly nothing anyone should be blamed for.

Re: Vaccinated Americans now may go without masks in most places, the CDC said

#496

Post by kelnos »

hhh wrote: post #366
guynamedloren wrote: post #325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t understand this. Does the hypothetical low risk person hypothetically work from home and rarely go out.. forever? If no, when/what is the trigger that changes this behavior?

I would prefer to wear a mask at the grocery store, but not at work when physically on-site. I'm low risk, and don't really have any desire to go out and get vaccinated mostly because I'm lazy, don't like needles, antisocial, and generally anxious in public. I don't really ever go out willingly, so I didn't really have an incentive to get vaccinated. Now I can get vaccinated and not wear a mask at work when it's 100+…

I'm really glad that you're going to get vaccinated!

But the thing that really bothers me about your previous rationale is that it doesn't take anyone else into account. What about people who would like to get vaccinated, but can't because they're deathly allergic to components of the vaccine (or some other medical reason)? What about people who would like to get vaccinated but can't afford to take time off work for the shot, or to rest during possible side effects?

You getting vaccinated protects those people too, when you walk past them in that grocery store. They deserve to be out and about without fear of infection just as much as you or I do.

Re: Vaccinated Americans now may go without masks in most places, the CDC said

#498

Post by tshaddox »

ddxxdd wrote: post #428
cycomanic wrote: post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know this gets repeated a lot, but that doesn't make it more true. Show me the quote where he said "we lied about masks", and "we changed our message about masks" doesn't count. The reality is that the knowledge about Covid changed significantly in march/April last year. In particular the understanding about unsymptomatic spread lead to a significant change of thinking. That makes sense, if the virus only spreads f…

2 weeks of asymptomatic spread has been known about since late January (edit: in 2020). [0] And Fauci said at one point (2/14/2020): “There is no reason for anyone right now in the United States, with regard to coronavirus, to wear a mask” [1] And at another point (6/15/2020): "[...] we were concerned the public health community, and many people were saying this, were concerned that it was at a time when personal pro…

> “There is no reason for anyone right now in the United States, with regard to coronavirus, to wear a mask”

Isn’t this defensible if it was indeed true that there was a temporary shortage of masks for health care workers?

Re: Vaccinated Americans now may go without masks in most places, the CDC said

#499

Post by jedberg »

sulam wrote: post #284
stjohnswarts wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Berkley is possibly the most liberal and educated area in the USA (of significant population) so of course it will be high. In your average city, we will be EXTREMELY lucky if it reaches 65-70%, in the rural areas of the country 50% would be a win.

Antivaxxers are strong in Berkeley. This is pretty impressive honestly, I would have expected to hit 90%, tops.

You're very right. Berkeley was the heart of the whole anti-vax movement a few years ago. So much so that I felt safer taking my (then newborn) to Eastern Europe than taking her to Berkeley.

But if you dig into the data, it's only one zip code in Berkeley with a high vax rate -- the wealthiest part of Berkeley up in the hills, which are mostly older people.

The zip code with all the students is one of the lowest in the state.

Re: Vaccinated Americans now may go without masks in most places, the CDC said

#500

Post by Jataman606 »

cko wrote: post #425
paganel wrote: post #408

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's crazy how politicised the mask has become in the States. Over here in my parts of Eastern-Europe the government just announced yesterday that starting tomorrow (Saturday) the mask won't be mandatory anymore in almost all outdoor spaces for everyone, a statement which was received with joy and relief by almost everyone, no matter their political orientation.

Ah, Romania. Though this country does seem to have one of the lowest vaccination rates.

It could be also Poland.
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