Mostly Apolitical Thread for Discussing/Venting our Rational/Irrational COVID-19 Fears and Experiences in 2020

doesnt make much sense to me, but tbf we're still taking certain precautions for extremely low likelihood transmission scenarios. even if its probably unnecessary, if all it costs is a little bit of extra time/slight hassle we figure whats the harm. peace of mind has been hard enough to come by over the past year, when its all over i wont be able to fault too many people for going overboard

i don't think there's been a documented case of anybody who caught COVID from a surface. not that it would be easy to determine, considering we don't know where the majority of people got their COVID, but afaict majority of transmission is human to human.

fomite paranoia was a lockdown thing, no evidence of transmission through groceries and stuf

well it's also cos originally the WHO/CDC seemed to think that was the main way it spread, and that it wasn't airborne.

I remember a really horrifying picture from China, early on, of workers in hazmat suits spraying entire streets with disinfectant. I can see how that would create some fears that are hard to shake.

the first time I moved in with my folks (temporarily), I wore a mask inside the house despite the fact that I only ever left it to go shopping. I kept using wipes on anything I touched, would run into the bathroom and scrub my hands for 20 seconds if I accidentally touched my mask.

I had people chastising me for opening my Amazon packages the day they came in. definitely was a different climate a year ago.

This really struck me when I made hamantaschen for Purim this year with my housemates. Last year it was a source of major stress: my housemate's mom sent her some in the mail; was that safe? Was it safe if my housemate put all the cookies on a plate with her bare hands, when we were being told under no circumstances to share food? This year it was just a normal day of making cookies.

I know people who have gone through wild swings of reaction over the past year. One friend who was so concerned that she went and quarantined herself from her family for a month, but then later got relaxed about it and starting going out way more than I have been. And then got COVID. And now seems fine, tho it was a recent case. Even those of us who talk about following the science have been pretty variable in what we decide is ok. I've tried hard not to be judgmental about other people's actions as long as they weren't being assholes. Unfortunately lots of people decided it was a great time to be assholes.

I was talking to a guy I know who owns a few restaurants about the whole past year, which of course has been super up and down for him. But the thing that he got most animated about was the anti-maskers. Just having to fight with assholes night after night after night.

is this where I ask whether there have been any documented transmissions from people not taking their shoes off/putting on hazmat boots when they walk into a friend's house?

i can't answer that, but according to the CDC "Currently, no cases of COVID-19 have been identified where infection was thought to have occurred by touching food, food packaging, or shopping bags." so it seems very unlikely.

it's an airborne disease. your friend should consider not letting people in their house if they're at risk. given that for whatever reason they're letting people visit, having them wear booties on likely confers no additional protection.

My gf's parents are going to get really annoying after getting their second dose and constantly try to get us to get dinner with them - our excuse this entire time has been "we don't want to be the reason you get sick!" but in reality we don't want to get ourselves sick and we never leave our apartment unless we have to. But her parents are raging narcissists and wouldn't accept any reasoning if we didn't make it about them.

I'm glad my own raging narcissist parents are at least also paranoid cause "parents guilt and shame you for not wanting to hang out in a pandemic" experience blows

pre-pandemic (which was also pre-dad's hospitalization, so I was only visiting the folks for dinner once a week), I was relieved to hear my mom say "I think we should avoid seeing each other for a bit to be safe", rather than making me feel guilty about not visiting.

Unfortunately lots of people decided it was a great time to be assholes.

friend of mine works at a theme park and approached a customer who was wearing their mask under their nose or something like that and he took it off and breathed heavily on her and ran off.

she almost quit that night.

I just....it blows my mind.

prior to all of this, if you told someone you found out some of your co-workers had the flu,and you were supposed to meet a friend, if that friend asked you to wear a mask to be safe because they didn't want to get the flu, most people would either be reasonable enough to do so or at least rain-check the hangout. I'm not even talking about high risk people - I'm talking about people who merely don't want their lives interrupted for a week or two while they deal with flu.

now it's like...people intentionally do something that could give someone a deadly and/or severely debilitating disease just for calling them out on bad behavior. I know Trump/Republicans had a lot to do that, and much of that damage might have been avoided without him/them, but....I just think this planet's full of people who should be melted by the sun.

our excuse this entire time has been "we don't want to be the reason you get sick!" but in reality we don't want to get ourselves sick and we never leave our apartment unless we have to.

My wife's parents are now both double-dosed, and they were all, hey, we should come visit! So of course my wife said sure, if you're confident, just keep in mind most of us aren't vaccinated. And her mom said, OK, how about in a couple of weeks! And my wife was all, whoa, slow down a little! How about mother's day or thereabouts? There's a much better chance more of us will be vaccinated by then. Meanwhile, my own mom, who is also about to get her second dose, has so many trips planned already (rescheduled from last year, planing to see new grandkid, etc.) that we don't know when we'll get to see her next. I mean, good for her. She's getting old, she's retired, she's been cooped up but the clock's still been ticking.

Getting my first dose on Thursday - guess I count as vulnerable or something.

my experience so far is that folks past 65 who are partially or fully vaccinated are somehow of the opinion that everyone is vaccinated or that in any case "it's okay now"

Haven't 80% of all covid deaths in the US been among those 65+? If I was in that demo I'd probably be done with it, too.

My fully vacc'd parents are gearing up for travelling too, though it's more in the vein of post-retirement seeing the world stuff (though they're not planning on leaving the US yet) rather than family visits. I do feel esp bad for my dad, who was basically immobilized with a back problem for about 6 months before Covid hit.

Man, my pal was telling me about his friend's older dad who caught H1N1 on a cruise, which lead to pneumonia, which almost killed him ... a month before covid hit.

News story today in my local media about a nurse who ended up testing positive two months after getting fully vaxxed. Not a terrible case, but symptomatic.

Well, 95% effective is 5% not effective, right?

my experience so far is that folks past 65 who are partially or fully vaccinated are somehow of the opinion that everyone is vaccinated or that in any case "it's okay now"

― G.A.G.S. (Gophers Against Getting Stuffed) (forksclovetofu), Monday, March 15, 2021 7:41 AM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

This is absolutely 100% true in my experience, too. My dad hasn't even had his first shot, and my parents already booked a cruise for the NYE period... news of which was met by me with absolute silence, then a "You think that you might be being a bit hasty?" and then asking "hey, you got travel insurance, right?"

xpost

Yep. Will be interesting to see where the ongoing infection rates settle once we hit peak vaccination. (And of course hopefully the hospitalization/death rates get very, very small.)

Cruises were a gigantic germapalooza even before COVID. It was in the news and everything. I am boggled that anyone thinks a cruise is a good idea.

me, my wife, and all my family - parents, aunt and uncle, sibling and cousin and their spouses, all of whom live within a few minutes of each other - are all going to be double-dosed within month and my mom is already INSANE about wanting us to come and hang out.

my only hesitation is if we hang out there would be six kids and ours is the only one not attending in-person school, so I don't know how to handle that yet

I’m going to be doing so much hanging out once my friends and I have the juice tbh

lol same and I don't feel the least guilty about it

The discrepancies in vaccinations across Europe, while I guess to be expected, do throw up some pretty strange anxieties - my wife's parents in France both have vaccine dates while my mum in Portugal says they're still at vaccinating the 90+ group, I get despairing e-mails from German relations wondering when will this ever end while here in the UK everyone's crossing their fingers to be out of it by late June.

Oh, I mean, some friends and I already have a dinner date for the exact day two weeks after the last of us gets the second dose. We're going to get LIT THE FUCK UP.

lol, both my parents have been vaccinated and my dad was like "I can't wait to get back to our place in FL so we can quarantine someplace warm"

Tbh i don’t really get the difference between hanging out with your friends and going on a cruise when you’re vaccinated

News story today in my local media about a nurse who ended up testing positive two months after getting fully vaxxed. Not a terrible case, but symptomatic.

― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Monday, March 15, 2021 12:17 PM bookmarkflaglink

why in the world is this a news story? obviously some folk are still going to contract it. by framing it as a news story, the media positions it as an anomaly and people extrapolate OMG VACCINE DOESN'T WORK from it.

honestly, I'll be wary of going on cruises well past this whole mess, largely because the idea of being stuck on a cruise ship when the next pandemic strikes is pretty much my worst fear

i woulda thought the "Poop Cruise" of a few years ago was enough dissuasion for everybody

next pandemic

Invent a Terrifying Scenario in Ten Words or Less thread

Tbh i don’t really get the difference between hanging out with your friends and going on a cruise when you’re vaccinated

― groovemaaan

You don't get the difference b/w hanging out with four or five vaccinated people vs a boatful of potentially hundreds of other unvaccinated strangers in close quarters, possibly with other illnesses?

I assume they would only let you on board if you're fully vaccinated no? If that's the case, I don't really see the problem.

There’s no vaccine for legionnaires disease

i feel like there is huge overlap between the population of idiots who love cruises and the population of idiots who won't get the vaccine

I sense a unique marketing opportunity

One thing to remember, I think, is that people in their seventies and eighties are used to living with a level of risk that most of us are unused to and would be very uncomfortable with, because when you're that age everything is risky. The vaccine drops your personal Covid risk down to a level that still feels high to many of us but probably feels familiar and acceptable to people who are older.

I enjoy cruises, but even in non-pandemic times, consider the following scenarios:

*Your plane experiences a technical malfunction in flight. It is detected in plenty of time, and you return to the original airport, get on a new plane, and you're on your way. If you crash into the water, you're dead, and it's over fast.

*Your cruise ship experiences a technical malfunction while on the water. it stops moving altogether, another ship has to come out and rescue you, and for three days, you are told to shit into a bag and hand it to the stewards of the ship. because of the malfunction, all of your shore excursions are cancelled, you don't get to do anything other than cry in your stifling hot room.

These are also literally small c cruises where the only people under 50 on board are workers, tbh— they're cultural cruises marketed to middle and upper-middle class people who have college degrees. (I've seen the brochures lol). It's not like my 72 year old parents are going to be rubbing skin and pounding frozen margs by a poop-laden pool.

that sounds like about every Regent cruise ever.

where all cruises are like $100,000 and mostly people spending pensions on it

everybody poops

i know nothing and wish to know nothing about cruises. i find the whole idea bizarre.