Thread by @FreedomFriesInc

Main reason I want healthcare workers with access to me to have to show their vaccine status? Tells me whether or not they understand science enough to be qualified for the job.

I will #GetVaccinated soon (NZ is slow.) Folk like me don't have a "99% chance" of survival.

BTW, I highlighted diabetes as a COVID complications risk factor but there are many other medical reasons I am in this category.

This is why I've taken Covid seriously since Jan 2020 when I first heard about it. I was also predisposed to trusting scientists over politicians.

People with health or disability issues (esp when long term) have to learn about medical science in order to stay alive. We have to educate everyone around us who could help increase or decrease our survival chances, often including healthcare workers who should know better.

Several things about reactions to the pandemic really get my goat. Especially the batshit insane far right trope that "Covid has a 99% survival rate."

It never has, for a good third of the population. Even more so with emerging variants (at a population level, let me explain):

While there is apparently no evidence that new Covid variants make an individual sicker than the first one, Delta is more transmissible. This means a higher number of cases, with corresponding impact on severe infection numbers. This means:

That there is more pressure on hospitals and ICU beds than before.

Even in the US, where ICU beds are more available than almost every other country, local hotspots are more likely.

Trained healthcare workers to staff them are a finite resource.

Pre-pandemic there was a global shortage of healthcare workers. This puts pressure on almost every country.

It has worsened bc worker migration has slowed to a trickle, older workers are less safe from Covid, some workers have died from Covid, & some have left the workforce.

Honestly I can't blame healthcare workers who have left the workforce because of the pandemic. We all have to put on our own oxygen mask first. It was a stressful industry pre-pandemic and it's now virtually a war zone, in terms of stress and distress levels.

A country can have an abundance of Covid ICU suitable ventilators but they aren't much use without trained, fit healthcare workers to use them. Such workers cannot be trained in less than several years.

This is one reason Biden's infrastructure bill includes healthcare workers.

Because a country needs certain infrastructure in order to survive natural disasters, including pandemics. There could be a new pandemic at any time.

The "infrastructure" of life-saving industries' skilled workforces is a market that requires government intervention. Anywhere.

This does not mean socialism by stealth, dumbasses.

It means your parent or grandparent in a nursing home will have a better chance of safe care, because the staffing situation won't be an absolute nightmare during a pandemic.

Any of us can need hospital care without warning.

It's so easy to throw stones at people who are trying to get a country through this pandemic without a ton of preventable deaths.

Over the past 30 years or so any (smart) government has had people working on the problem of increasing pressures on the healthcare workforce.

Even without pandemic planning it would be necessary to work on this issue.

The US infrastructure bill is taking too damn long to pass. Democrats have the option of ending the filibuster. That option looks more attractive by the day.

If the filibuster survives, then >17 Republicans need to try tapping into their basic humanity to get enough Senators to the magical 67 votes pt.

People are literally dying while America waits for the infrastructure bill.

They are NOT "people who would die anyway," either.

Failing that, I urge individuals to #GetVaccinated. Because virtually EVERYONE now hospitalized with Covid was unvaccinated.

Not everyone in that category is an anti-vaxxer. It's important to understand that...

There are (broadly) four groups:

1. Keen to vax, with good access.
2. Pro-vax, with access problems.
3. Vaccine hesitant, with good access.
4. Anti-vax, regardless of access.

Please work on ignoring Group 4. I know it's hard, but try.

We who support as many as possible getting vaccinated, need to focus on Groups 2 and 3 instead.

Yes, there are access problems for some groups in some places. You can volunteer to help those who need it. Look for local programs.

Vaccine hesitant people can be helped, too.

Despite all my knowledge as a long term amateur student of medical science, there was a few months in 2020 when I was for the first time in my life vaccine "hesitant." Note: I changed my mind and became super pro-vax. Knowing about the usual research timeframe had been the issue.

What helped me? I weighed the pros and cons, both on my own and with my longtime family doctor. I never claim any Covid vaccine is "completely safe," but I do talk about why I think the benefits greatly outweigh the risks, such as they are. Evidence for this grows all the time.

If you are trying to help a Trump supporter weigh vaccine pros and cons, ask them if Trump has received the vaccine. Have ready some links to media* about the answer to this question.

*Not CNN, MSNBC, NYT, or WaPo. See if FOX ever covered it, or WSJ, NYPost etc.

Also:

Be ready for them not to listen to ANY media source about Trump quietly receiving the Covid vax in January 2021 while in office.

MAGA folk don't actually trust FOX News. They just like some of the presenters. The most far right ones: Tucker, Ingraham, Hannity.

Be ready for "Trump only did that because... " or "Trump got a saline shot instead" or... literally any excuse is used now.

Remember we are never going to be able to reach all of them from the reality-based community. We're looking for those _willing_ to think for themselves.

The US gov has enough resources at the moment to be able to send Covid response units to the 5 hotspot areas with low vax rates & a rising number of cases, hospitalizations, & deaths from Covid.

But this approach is a drain on the resources needed for countless other things.

Winning over every possible person will contribute directly and indirectly to saving lives and also building back better in general.

Trumpers scoff at #BuildBackBetter which, I admit, is partly why I use it.😉

IMO, we _can_ build back better, and we must attempt it. There is no alternative.

Whining about critical race theory and Dr Seuss books isn't going to make America safer, stronger, or fairer.

I say "we" because the world needs the US to be awesome. We are lost without you.

Among America's traditional allies, there is Covid pandemonium, and it's not getting any better. I don't need you to send American cash or personnel.

I just need America to be a stable, democratic, nation of laws again.

And here is the graphic I meant to include earlier.

I screengrabbed it from a TV video clip. Details here:

CDC: covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tra…

WH briefing slides: whitehouse.gov/wp-content/upl…

Transcript: whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/…

This graphic from the WH briefing slideset linked above is very interesting.

Right now, most of the US is getting a much needed (temporary) break from the worst of the pandemic.

But certain counties are rapidly becoming hotspots.

I care about innocent people being harmed.

I shouldn't have to point out that I care about innocent people being harmed.

But this is what happens when a man who evidently doesn't, is elected, then leaves the safety of the country in a worse state than how he found it in 2017.

I say this as a proud Ex-MAGA person.

I've seen folk on both sides dismissing Covid hotspot deaths as the Darwin Award in action. There are nuances around how they phrase it, but the message is the same.

A virus doesn't care what you believe. Being unmoved about preventable death tells me a lot about character.

The spiking death rates in the current 5 Covid hotspot counties that officials and media are talking about will affect all Americans, one way or another.

That's why vaccine advocates like me are urgently trying to reach as many vaccine hesitant people as we can.

I will never agree with mandatory vaccination for the general population. And I seriously doubt that even the Biden admin would try it.

The best way to prevent such a draconian and self-defeating step is to try to persuade the merely hesitant. Lives depend on this.