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

Oh yeah -- my nieces are home after exposure to a couple cases last Friday.

There have definitely been a few positive cases at our high school, but that's a few out of 3,500 kids. The rule right now is that if you are vaccinated and asymptomatic you do not need to quarantine, even if you are exposed. However, as I'm dealing with, it's hard to say what is or is not a symptom.

As a teacher, I'd be happy if parents started keeping their kids home from school for normal colds more often. I realize that's not always possible/convenient for the parents, but from my POV it's not that hard to catch the students up after they've been out, and I could do without the the whole twice-yearly ritual of catching an awful cold from dozens of sick students, struggling to teach through it, and then giving up, getting a sub, and spending the next few weeks scrambling to get the class back on track.

Yeah, we definitely try to keep our son home when he's clearly got a cold, even when we get pressure from the school. I wish elementary schools would stop focusing on "perfect attendance" and rewarding it, because I think that really reinforces this idea that you should send your kid to school NO MATTER WHAT.

I have a beverage cooler that my brother regifted me, that he got as a reward for Perfect Attendance at the company he worked for. It says "hot or cold - you can count on me", which basically means, "whether I have a cold or the flu, no matter, I will be in the office passing it around like a hot potato."

fuck, the first thing I say when I teach a class at work is "take care of yourself if you're sick, we will find a way to get you caught up". now granted most of my learners are virtual but fuck the "come in unless you're dying" attitude

Runny or blocked nose & sneezing are common symptoms of delta iirc, basically if you think you have a cold I would not call that “asymptomatic”

If one tiny shred of good comes out of this, perhaps it will be that the normalization of remote work / remote learning allows people with a cold to stay the fuck at home and still get (at least some) stuff done.

My children will have to miss a couple days of school for a family function soon, and instead of angsting about it we're just like "eh, treat it like we treated the last two school years." They can get the homework online and attend classes while traveling.

It is also hay fever season tho. I remember when Covid first hit, there was a Spiderman meme with three Spidermen— one labelled Covid, one labelled Seasonal Allergies, and the other labelled Bong Rips. That is almost certainly the trifecta for me, too— a few weeks ago my allergies started acting up and I was deathly afraid I had gotten the 'Vid...but then it turned out that I just needed to take an Allegra.

and also do a bong rip

well, yeah.

I wish elementary schools would stop focusing on "perfect attendance" and rewarding it, because I think that really reinforces this idea that you should send your kid to school NO MATTER WHAT.

It was literally my job to do this for 5 years, to incentivize kids toward perfect attendance and give them prizes for coming to school sick basically. Not great.

Before you @ me, we had a big grant that was mandated for that purpose which we got for political/borderline fraudulent reasons because our daily attendance was already extremely high, it was just a resource grab by the principal. So I had to spend a lot of money and then show how it had "helped" but the thing I was supposed to spend it on was not needed or wanted, ie nobody has 100% attendance unless they came to school sick and their families never went anywhere.

Rapid test came back negative. Sometimes cold symptoms are just cold symptoms.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7WxDTEszGJQ

Our high school has a weekly dashboard with covid stats. Just for your proxy fun:

Aug. 13-19 there was one positive student, 11 students in quarantine (due to close contact), 1 positive employee, 1 employee in quarantine
Aug. 20-26 there were 2 positive students, 87 in quarantine (due to close contact), 4 positive employees, 5 in quarantine (due to close contact)

For reference, this is in a school of about 3600 kids, with approximately 73% having provided proof of vax. There is no vax requirement as of yet, but that's already been announced for staff and teachers, who are largely vaxxed but required by the state to be vaxxed by October. Kids and teachers who are vaxxed and have no symptoms do not need to quarantine, even if they've been exposed or in close contact with a positive case. We did some back of the envelope math and figure about 8 kids in each class of say 30 may not be vaccinated, or have not provided proof of vaccination, so if one kid tests positive and makes it through a day of classes, that could be 8 kids per period that would need to quarantine, barring additional vaxxed kids with symptoms who then test positive (and clearly there have not been many/any of them yet). The school, afaict, is keeping track of those that have not yet provided proof of vax, so it's less likely any of them are slipping through the cracks after covid exposure.

If one tiny shred of good comes out of this, perhaps it will be that the normalization of remote work / remote learning allows people with a cold to stay the fuck at home and still get (at least some) stuff done.

If my workplace is any indication, it isn't changing one iota. In fact, there seems to be a bizarre and even greater importance on "butts in seats" now than I've ever seen. In fact, in one of our "return to the office" Zooms, a high up essentially said "now that you've all had your 18 month vacation, there really is no excuse to not be in the office every day".

The capitalistic drive back to """"""normal""""" is in full force.

The “normal” is not sustainable environmentally or mentally. There has to be greater amount of telework in the future. Companies that insist on butts in seats five days a week should lose out to more flexible ones. I think states should also pass laws requiring reasonable accommodations for telework.

I'm with you. It's maddening to watch this from within.

Companies that insist on butts in seats five days a week should lose out to more flexible ones.

This is mos def happening in my work world, but I am well aware it's a privilege bubble. Companies hereabouts are desperate to attract and retain people, and are recruiting for almost all positions as fully remote, anywhere in the US.

i feel v fortunate that my company is fully embracing remote work and i am embracing it right back

hope all these other assholes follow suit soon

My favorite new twist in "must be back in the office" is that, quite understandably, almost no one is taking public transportation so it has resulted in 35-45 minute wait times just to EXIT the parking garage at the end of the day, regardless of the time you leave.

Started working freelance remotely again today after a few very slow months. I cleaned my home office. Have coffee, selzer, and vape pen by my side.

I was talking with my friend yesterday, noting that I haven't worn "work clothes" in more than a year, and never ever want to go back.

I taught in person in an actual classroom today; the last time I did so was in the same room 540 days ago. I had to actually think really hard about what I needed to wear after a summer of shorts and t-shirts and months of teaching online in pajama pants and a hooded sweatshirt.

My favorite new twist in "must be back in the office" is that, quite understandably, almost no one is taking public transportation so it has resulted in 35-45 minute wait times just to EXIT the parking garage at the end of the day, regardless of the time you leave.

Probably, but I'll be honest, until my son gets vaccinated I'm not exactly liking the idea of adding a crowded train on top of being back at the office full time. Seems like an extra vector that I can easily avoid for now.

I just encountered a new one (for me). My ... wife's stepsister's husband is a very smart guy who claims various medical conditions mean he should not get vaccinated. He is not a doctor, and this is no one's medical opinion, just his. And yet, he takes Covid very, very seriously. He wears an N95 mask whenever he leaves the house, which is exclusively to go to his home office, of which he is the only employee, at a different house he owns. Otherwise, he essentially never leaves the house. My mother in law and her husband were just there to hang with their granddaughter and offered to babysit so the parents could go out, and they even said no, because he's unvaccinated! That's ... I was going to say crazy, but he takes Covid so seriously even the prospect of vaccination is not enough for him to let his guard down, I guess. Irrational, I suppose? Which is also surprising from an MIT grad.

That's sad, but it makes sense to me that someone prone to health-related fears could be equally scared of illness and medication. I'm a bit like that myself - I have an irrational fear of allergic reactions that had me in a state of intense anxiety as I was getting my shot. Luckily I'm not that phobic and my fear of Covid outweighed my fear of the vaccine, but I feel bad for anyone who has that kind of phobia to a degree that's paralyzing.

"who claims various medical conditions mean he should not get vaccinated"

unless it was a previous severe reaction to a vaccine I can't imagine what that would be

Any time someone says they have a medical condition or allergy that keeps them from getting vaxxed, the first question that pops in my head is "did you discuss this with a doctor?"

Yeah. And as I posted, this is not a doctor's medical opinion.

There probably are a few among the unvaxxed who may have heard the worst about the side effects of the vaccines and it just short circuits their rationality.

Honestly over the last year I have been kind of annoyed by people going on about their vaccine side effects. I give myself an injection of beta interferon every week that has much worse side effects

I slept several hours longer than usual after each of my jabs. It was horrifying, truly the stuff of nightmares.

:)

https://www.bbc.com/news/health-58410584

Oh hey look

really don't know what your point is but glad someone has found the data now

we will never have better data about the long-term effects of covid-19 than today

kids can't just wait around 10 years for longitudinal studies to live their lives, they grow up

depressing to go down to the local men's shed and find out that everybody is a covid conspiracist. Maybe it should be expected.
BUt I don't think I was . From geezer i hadn't met who was repeating stories of how it had been proven that the virus was created by the US in a Wuhan lab to an old acquaintance who was talking about how everything was an attempt to control the public and we were going to have food shortages by the end of teh year as further control. Before lap[sing into some Climate change doubt.
I guess this is what people have been having to put up with regularly from people and it did seem that most people had been vaccinated.

But god I had hopes for what that resource might mean.

maybe covid conspiracy theorist.
NOt good taht one of them was also going on about the misuse and sale of National resources which was an actuality. maybe that is a mix people are also aware of elsewhere. Really was hoping for something else though.

I am in the middle of a four-week trial in downtown LA. We have 12 jurors and had three alternates - until one tested positive on Tuesday, and was excused. They notified the other jurors yesterday AFTER a full day in court. If we lose one more juror, we will have a mistrial and it won't get tried again until the middle of NEXT year. Of the 12 left, I could see several of them saying "Fuck THIS" and just not showing up, claiming a positive test.

I went and got tested yesterday and it came back negative. Will go and get the PCR test in about 5 days.

jesus. that sounds hellish.

(data reported from hospitals directly, beyond DeSantis's reach, so no concerns of accuracy)

BREAKING Florida

Continued slow improvement!

Hospitalizations down below 15K for first time since 8/8.
(Still WELL above earlier peaks).

ICU COVID down.

Still critical occupancy levels, but improvement is good!

Mask, Vaccinate, Test, Avoid high risk situations. pic.twitter.com/545DdBMFxy

— (((Howard Forman))) (@thehowie) September 2, 2021

Welp I already have a confirmed Covid case in one of my classes. That was fast!

I have no idea what I'm actually allowed to talk about online and it's prob not hard to figure out my name and where I work if anyone tried, so I guess maybe I'll finally join the 77 borad

Sharing more of our principal's high school transparency, for comparison's sake:

First off, I’m pleased to report that our vaccination rate is at 79% of students and 84% of employees, which exceeds the original overall target of 70% for approaching herd immunity. However, the Delta variant has changed the equation. According to our most recent guidance, a fully vaccinated rate of closer to 90% or higher is what we need to aim for now.

That’s a realistic target. Vaccination is safe and effective, and it remains the number one way to prevent the spread of COVID. I urge everyone eligible to get fully vaccinated as soon as possible.

Additional good news is that three weeks into the school year, our weekly number of positive cases of COVID has remained low--in the single digits. You can check the dashboard on our website to see weekly updates on the number of new COVID cases as well as persons in quarantine. One thing you won’t find on the dashboard this year are any thresholds for moving toward hybrid or fully remote learning, because per the state, these are not options this school year. In-person classes for all is the priority, and we have a variety of mitigations in place to ensure that we can follow that directive while keeping everyone in our building as safe and healthy as possible.

Our case numbers have included two outbreaks since classes began. Outbreak is a very specific term for which the criteria has changed, according to the Illinois Department of Public Health. Currently, an outbreak is defined as two epidemiologically linked cases where transmission is believed to have occurred at school between members of different households; last year the criteria for an outbreak was five such cases.

The first outbreak involved three employees, while the second involved five students. We are required to report all positive cases to the health department, which specifically investigates any outbreaks to determine the extent of the spread. We have been in very close contact with the health department, and it is not advising that we take any additional mitigation measures at this time. Our students are doing a fantastic job of complying with masking requirements, which goes a long way toward reducing COVID cases and outbreaks. Thank you.

as safe and healthy as possible

Feel like there are some words missing from the end of this sentence.

Good luck, Lily.

I volunteered a couple of shifts for Galway Arts Festival yesterday. Both had very few attendees , one is going to be circulated as a podcast, would love to have a permanent record of the other.
Both needed people to be masked throughout and asked people to sit in pods of 2 with a lot of space between them. & had initially asked people to have covid certificates as well as the volunteers. So that's a step in the right direction.
JUst reading people's fears of indoor venues above in the thread.